Chapter 416: Stone Lungs

Ren chose the court for their camp.

The fourth basin lay beside its open edge, deep enough for Bolt to turn below the bank. The ledge they had followed broadened before it reached the court. Beneath it, a lower shelf skirted the water and rose toward the dry margin.

Near that rise, a shallow pocket opened into the basin through a narrow slit. Riptide passed through it while Ren examined the bank. A loose stone cover lay beside the outlet, with an old seating groove beneath it.

He set their supplies against the carved wall. From the end of the nearest bench, he could see the upper approach and most of the shelf below. He would take the first watch there.

Anvil settled inside the court with its wounded leg resting on the stone. Balm’s tray remained secured above the shell. Bolt waited in the basin beneath the approach; Riptide moved between the pocket and the deeper water.

Ren put the lamp beside the first carving and unwrapped the broken specimen.

Its curved wall resembled the cavity cut into the figure’s chest. He turned the piece to compare its ribbed surface with the shallow lines in the relief.

On the bank, the leader’s openings had closed briefly between releases. After Ren’s spear entered, air had escaped through the wound and later through the crack in the chamber.

The organ had held pressure. The openings controlled its release.

He could not tell how much it held or how quickly it filled. He had never seen it refill, and the broken working gave him no complete route through the chamber.

Farther along the wall, several cavities were joined inside one figure. If those connections carried pressure between them, a closed opening might leave another ready to fire.

Ren traced one of the carved links with his finger, then looked back along the approach.

The ledge was empty.

He added the question beside his drawing, wrapped the specimen and returned it to his pack. The court’s stone was cold beneath the bench. Anvil had lowered its shell and was keeping the dressed joint still.

Water broke against the bank.

Bolt had turned sharply toward the lower shelf. It came back beneath the court’s edge and held there, its attention reaching Ren through the bond.

Ren rose with his spear.

— • —

Five figures approached along the ledge.

Two carried long hooked poles. Two others had short spears and flat bundles strapped against their backs. Between them walked a broad-chested man with a stone-headed spear. Openings beneath his ribs widened as he drew breath. Another pair showed lower on his flanks.

Ren asked privately about him.

[ATTAINMENT: JOINED CHAMBERS.]

[DANGER TO HOST: HIGH.]

The four others descended onto the lower shelf. The pole carriers took the rising path toward the court’s edge; the other two stayed beside the water. The leader remained on the upper ledge.

Ren stepped out to meet him before he reached the supplies.

The man’s right openings flared.

Air struck Ren’s forward shoulder and threw grit across the stone. He turned with the blow, Titanhide active, and brought his spear toward the leader’s weapon. He expected another release and kept his weight ready to move.

The second struck while the first was still driving against him.

It came lower, across his hip. His boot slid sideways. He caught himself a stride from where he had planted it, the spear shaft jarring his arm as its butt struck stone.

The leader thrust at his chest.

Ren beat the point aside and regained his footing. The lower flank openings spread while those beneath the right ribs closed. Pressure swept across his coat from another angle.

He had expected a follow-up. He had not allowed for two releases driving him in different directions at once.

A pole struck shell behind him.

Ren gave ground toward the court, keeping the leader’s point in front of him. Movement below the ledge caught his eye. One margin fighter was unfastening a flat stone from his back. The other had reached the shallow pocket and was thrusting down into it.

Riptide slipped through the outlet into the pocket, keeping its body between that spear and the rise into the court.

The leader advanced again.

Ren brought his point toward the exposed flank. The man turned with it and struck downward at the shaft, releasing from the lower openings as he stepped. Ren pulled his spear clear and caught the weapon on his guard. The blow drove his forearm against his chest.

He could hear Anvil moving behind him. Circling farther toward the basin would leave the leader a straight approach to the crab.

Ren held the inner line. He lifted his point toward the man’s face, forcing the stone spear up to meet it, then slid his forward hand along the haft. The leader lowered his head behind the crossed weapons. Ren stepped close enough to drive against the arm holding them.

He forced the stone head outward. Air struck from the right. Ren moved with the shove, keeping the weapons engaged, and planted his foot outside the man’s forward leg.

The leader tried to bring his spear back across.

Ren drove against it with the thicker part of his shaft. The weapon arm folded across the man’s chest, and Ren shortened his grip as they turned. The left openings began to widen.

The neck was exposed above the leather.

Ren kept his point clear of the chest and drove it into the gap.

The man’s spear scraped along Ren’s shaft, then dropped. His knees struck the stone. Ren withdrew and stepped clear as air rushed through two openings together.

He turned toward Anvil.

The pole fighters stood on either side of the crab’s front. One jabbed low as Anvil turned, then shifted farther around when the wounded leg took a short step. His next thrust went toward that joint.

Anvil reset its feet to face him. The second fighter struck from the other side before it had finished turning.

The shell rocked. A foot scraped toward the bank.

Ren moved back into the court.

The nearer fighter thrust low again. Anvil gave a short step inward and turned with it. The hooked head glanced along the plate above the joint and passed behind the shell.

The man stumbled after the pole. Anvil’s claw struck his haft, forcing him to pull it free before he could thrust again.

The other fighter jabbed at the front of the shell, trying to hold Anvil facing him.

Anvil shifted toward that blow, then turned as the nearer man committed to another low thrust. This time the crab stepped into the space beside the pole. The point scraped past its leg, and a claw closed around the fighter’s upper body.

Anvil drove him against the bank. His pole fell into the water. The claw tightened, and his feet stopped moving.

The second pole fighter backed toward the ridge face, keeping his hook between himself and the crab.

Ren crossed far enough to put Anvil outside his line. Behind the man lay bare rock, clear of the carved wall.

Close Sever passed through him and scored the stone beyond. He fell with the pole still across his hands.

A hard splash came from the pocket.

The margin fighters had dropped its loose cover across the outlet. The flat stone from the bundle wedged one end in place. Water still passed beneath it, but the opening Riptide had used was narrowed almost shut.

Riptide held in the shallow pocket. One man kept his spear between the serpent and the bank while the other pressed his foot against the wedge.

Bolt surged toward the obstruction from the basin.

Its first jet struck low against the wedging stone. Water burst up around the man’s ankle. He lifted his foot, then stamped it back down.

Bolt turned below the surface and struck again.

The wedge slipped. The cover tilted against its old seat, opening a gap beneath one edge.

Riptide drew the pocket’s current toward it. Water drove through the opening and washed the loosened wedge farther out. The cover shifted again, and Riptide passed into the basin beneath it.

The man bent to recover the stone.

Riptide caught the submerged end of his spear in the current and pulled it sideways. His shoulder followed. Bolt’s jet struck the exposed side of his neck at the waterline.

He dropped against the cover and slid into the basin. Riptide turned through the disturbed water beneath him.

The other spearman left the pocket and ran up the bank toward the court.

Ren moved to intercept him.

The man raised his point as he came over the lip. Ren struck the short spear aside and stepped past it. His own point entered beneath the lifted arm, stopping the charge.

The fighter fell against him. Ren drew back, freed the blade and let the body settle onto the stone.

He looked along the ledge and the shelf below it.

Neither held another figure.

Anvil released the man in its claw. In the basin, Riptide moved the fallen spearman toward the bank while Bolt circled outside the drifting body.

The leader’s lower openings still hissed behind Ren.

— • —

Ren checked the companions before approaching the bodies.

Anvil stood with the wounded leg tucked close. Fresh blood had darkened part of the dressing. Ren helped it lower onto the dry stone, removed the cloth and cleaned the torn place. He brought Balm’s tray down beside the joint.

The moss spread from its damp turf onto the wound.

Riptide remained in the deeper water. Grit trailed from its clear body into the current before it came alongside the bank. Bolt waited farther out, watching the lower shelf.

Ren’s shoulder ached when he lifted his arm. He rolled it once and tightened his grip on the spear. The movement hurt, but his hand held.

He brought the lamp over and set it beside the leader.

One lower opening released a thin stream of air after the others had fallen quiet. Ren kept the body’s outlets clear and waited until that discharge faded too.

He turned the openings away from the resting group before cutting the chest covering. With the spear’s edge, he worked between the mineral plates beneath it and exposed the chambers.

Four lay inside: two higher in the chest and two along the flanks. Thick passages joined their curved walls. At one junction, Ren could follow the grown connection toward more than one outlet.

He examined the upper chamber farthest from the neck wound.

Its wall was whole. He cut through the adjoining passages clear of it, keeping the short ends attached as he eased the organ free. Within the ribbed stone, the working continued around the chamber and into those severed connections.

He had preserved one organ. Its links to the others remained cut.

Ren wrapped it and tied a tag to the cloth: whole chamber, court attacker, four reservoirs observed. The cracked piece stayed in its separate wrapping inside his pack.

A flat tablet hung from the leader’s belt. Grooves crossed one face, branching around shallow hollows and ending at notches. Ren turned it beneath the lamp, then put it away. He had nothing yet to match it against.

He brought the bodies onto dry ground beyond their supplies. The spearman from the basin lay still when Ren lifted him from the bank. Each weapon went beside its owner.

Before lifting the leader, Ren drew the cut covering back across the opened chest. One edge caught beneath a mineral ridge. He freed it and laid it flat, then carried the body to the others.

By the time he returned, Balm had begun withdrawing from Anvil’s leg.

Ren dressed the wound and secured the tray again. The crab remained resting while he took his place where he could watch both approaches.

Meals and watches marked the interval that followed. Anvil gradually put more weight through the leg, though its step stayed short when it turned. Balm rested between treatments. Bolt brought fish from the basin, and Riptide checked the outgoing course before returning to the court.

Ren compared the chambers during the quiet stretches. He added the visible junctions to his drawing and marked the cut ends. The relief had shown connections; the body had supplied their shapes. He could follow only part of the working in the removed organ.

He shaped two hollow halves from ordinary stone, padded them with cloth and enclosed the intact chamber between them. Cord held the case shut. He fastened it against Anvil’s carrier, clear of Balm’s tray and the moving legs.

Anvil walked across the court and turned back. Ren checked the fastenings and shifted one away from the edge of a plate.

"That one stays with you."

The crab settled while he tightened the cord. The case remained distinct from his pack and from the supplies beside the moss.

Ren fastened the lamp to his belt when the group moved on. Riptide led them into the outgoing watercourse.

It descended through a sloping cut beyond the fourth basin. A ledge followed above it, widening at the bends. Riptide checked the lower stretches while Bolt waited in the deeper water behind. Anvil took the turns carefully, the case secure beside its carrier.

At the cavern’s end, the ledge turned out onto the ridge face.

A broad basin lay below, enclosed between pale stone walls. Their channel entered along the near side. Across the bowl, water divided between a far course and a narrower branch curving around a projecting ridge. A raised return followed the stone above them.

A wall stood over the far course. Its top was notched, and a steep climbing shelf reached it from the water.

Ren followed the ledge down to the near bank. The companions remained together while he approached the junction of the narrower branch and put a hand against the grown lip.

The flow entering that branch eased. Through the joined stone, he felt the change returning from beyond its bend. More water took the raised course while the mouth beneath his hand stayed open.

He followed the response to the first connection and lost it farther along.

The same relationship he had found above the court survived here. He marked the accessible junction in his notebook, then looked toward the channel beneath the wall.

Bolt swam through the near pool and returned. Riptide held beneath the near junction.

Ren took out the tablet.

He turned it until a fork lay beneath his thumb. Beside it, a crooked groove curved around a shallow hollow. The narrower branch ahead followed that bend around the projecting ridge.

The other groove continued past a notch. Ren looked from it to the broad channel and the first wall above it.

Farther along the ridge, a second fortification showed through a gap in the stone. Another notch lay along the same groove on the tablet.

Ren stopped there. The remaining marks belonged to ground he could not see.

The nearer wall controlled the broad watercourse and the climbing shelf beside it. From their bank, he could follow that channel as far as the dark opening at its base.

The channel continued beneath the first wall.