Rautos nodded, convinced by Taxilian’s reasoning.
‘Haunted,’ said Breath. ‘You’re going to get us all killed, Taxilian. So I now curse your name, your soul. I will make you pay for killing me.’
He glanced at her, said nothing.
Rautos spoke. ‘See that hind foot, Taxilian? It is the only one on a pedestal.’
The two men headed off in that direction.
Breath walked up to Asane. ‘Spin that cocoon, woman, make yourself somewhere you can hide inside. Until you’re nothing but a rotted husk. Don’t think you can crawl back out. Don’t think you can show us all your bright, painted wings. Your hopes, Asane, your dreams and secrets-all hollow.’ She held up a thin spidery hand. ‘I can crush it all, so easily-’
Last stepped up to her, then pushed her back so that she stumbled. ‘I grow tired of listening to you,’ he said. ‘Leave her alone.’
Breath cackled and danced away.
‘Thank you,’ said Asane. ‘She is so… hurtful.’
But Last faced her and said, ‘This is not a place for fears, Asane. Conquer yours, and do it soon.’
Nearby, Nappet snickered. ‘Dumb farmer’s maybe not so dumb after all. Doesn’t make him any less ugly though, does it?’ He laughed.
As Rautos and Taxilian drew closer to the hind limb they could see that the pedestal was rectangular, like the foundation of a temple. The vertical wall facing them, as tall as they were, bore the faint remnants of a frieze, framed in an elaborate border. All too eroded to interpret. But no sign of an entranceway.
‘We are confounded again,’ Rautos said.
‘I do not think so,’ Taxilian replied. ‘You look wrongly, friend. You search out what rises in front of you. You scan right and left, you crane your sight upward. Yes, the city encourages such deception. The dragon invites it, perched as it is. And yet…’ He pointed.
Rautos followed the line of that lone finger, and grunted in surprise. At the base of the pedestal, wind-blown sands formed a hollow. ‘The way in is downward .’
Sheb joined them. ‘We need to dig.’
‘I think so,’ agreed Taxilian. ‘Call the others, Sheb.’
‘I don’t take orders from you. Errant piss on you highborn bastards.’
‘I’m not highborn,’ said Taxilian.
Sheb sneered. ‘You make like you are, which is just as bad. Get back down where you belong, Taxilian, and if you can’t manage on your own then I’ll help and that’s a promise.’
‘I just have some learning, Sheb-why does that threaten you so?’
Sheb rested a hand on one of his daggers. ‘I don’t like pretenders and that’s what you are. You think big words make you smarter, better. You like the way Rautos here respects you, you think he sees you as an equal. But you’re wrong in that-you ain’t his equal. He’s just humouring you, Taxilian. You’re a clever pet.’
‘This is how Letherii think,’ said Rautos, sighing. ‘It’s what keeps everyone in their place, upward, downward-even as people claim they despise the system they end up doing all they can to keep it in place.’
Taxilian sighed in turn. ‘I do understand that, Rautos. Stability helps remind you of where you stand. Affirms you’ve got a legitimate place in society, for good or ill.’
‘Listen to you two shit-eaters.’
By this time the others had arrived. Taxilian pointed at the depression. ‘We think we’ve found a way in, but we’ll have to dig.’
Last approached with a shovel in his hands. ‘I’ll start.’
The ghost hovered, watching. Off to the west, the sun was settling into horizon’s lurid vein. When Last needed a rest, Taxilian took his place. Then Nappet, followed by Sheb. Rautos tried then, but by this point the pit was deep and he had difficulty making his way down, and an even harder time flinging the sand high enough to keep it from sifting back. His stint did not last long before, with a snarl, Sheb told him to get out and leave the task to the lowborns who knew this business. Last and Taxilian struggled to lift Rautos out of the pit.
In the dusty gloom below, the excavation had revealed one edge of stone facing, the huge blocks set without mortar.
The argument from earlier disturbed the ghost, although he was not sure why it was so. He was past such silly things, after all. The games of station, so bitter, so self-destructive-it all seemed such a waste of time and energy, the curse of people who could look outward but never inward. Was that a measure of intelligence? Were such hapless victims simply dimwitted, incapable of introspection and honest self-judgement? Or was it a quality of low intelligence that its possessor instinctively fled the potentially deadly turmoil of knowing too many truths about oneself?
