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We descended the steps These cels --or just places where tinkers performed their duties They were too close-packed to be any sort of reasonable colection of looe, five or six h, and twice as wide Soe--even in the darkness, there was a regularity, a craftsmanship, to the vertical wal of bars, as wel as bluish tint Keeping close, we folowed a narrow, sinuous corridor toward the cage

I glanced into several of the cels and saw chairs, smal tables, shelves--tools and piled supplies of bark, wood, leather The craftsn--other than the leering faces on the door fraht have been

In a few dreadful ht only hinted at aited within: a great lu as ten or twelve men piled upon each other--a pile of corpses, then? Sootten?

But the slints of phosphorescence seerassland evening--provoking a shiver, a hint of slow, uncertain reat fish, or soed up and left here!"

Gah the bars, and neither responded to my theory, nor moved in any way He had becoree, andpassed between our old spirits--nothing complex

Si before

It’s a Gravematic description with a quick series of memories I could only half- interpret

Before either of us--Gamelpar or me--had a chance to understand, the mass made a sudden, spase and green fire--crawling veins of light, literaly veins! Like glowing, burning blood vessels on the body of a flayed beast--and yet not one beast, not one anied in this e of liether, fore

Instead, ere seeing a mass of Forerunners--Warrior- Servants or others of that kind, I thought, but there was no way to know for sure They had been gathered up as if by some monstrous sculptor andclay, but more horrible yet--some stil had heads, torsos, faces, and soh the bars, and atching us with faintly glowing eyes

Theshudder beneath our feet

Then ca, many voices in one, but the words poorly coordinated, spread out and blurred into an awful, cacophonic lament

I could only understand so to say

They wanted to be free

They wanted to die

They could not decide which

Then thewe had not noticed before--a transparent wal or field, very like the bubble in which I had been swept away froe Forerunners had wrapped this thing, this mass, this Grave it and this place, died before they could reclaim their felows and cure them of this atrocity

If they have a cure, which I doubt very rabbed Gamelpar, lifted hiht in the hal, frolow that re out in false hope, pain, despair

Chapter Fifteen

IN OUR PANIC, we could not quickly find our way back to the sht, al three of us, blundering through the twilight cast by the sky bridge, kept co acrosson decks, bridges, ays, or within dwelings

Hundreds of thens of explosions or fire, only of sharp blades--perhaps fishing tools, likely human-made--or improvised clubs, and of course none wore protective arainst each other in this ht until al had died --down to the very last Forerunner, I guessed, and the Lord of Adht for a prize--or to prevent that prize fro hands

"What prize?" I cried out as I ran, Vinnevra close behind, Ga that, we both stopped, until I saw hi along a far bridge

"Youtwochildren!" he shouted "It’s back that way

You missed it" We backtracked to join him He led us back to the ladder, the hatch--al in deeper darkness, until we could only feel with our feet the last flight of steep stairs down to the docks, and hear the lapping of the waves against the dock and the pilars al around

In the deepest shadow of al, we ed to crawl into the boat, cast off the line, pick up our oars, and push out froe

While above, not nearly far enough above, the e shook, dropping grit and dirt and who could guess what else down on our heads and necks and shoulders

Out under the stars and the sky bridge, we picked at each other, tossing away the falen bits, then took turns diving into the water, quickly sluicing, cli for whatever ht now, not sea creatures--but other things entirely

I held Gas in the water, then puled hi with the cold

"What did you see?" Vinnevra kept asking "What was it?"

Neither Gamelpar nor I had the heart to tel her

We were e, away fro us noard the west, inland, away froer needed to row

We colapsed in the bottom of the boat and slept

Chapter Sixteen

THE CURRENT MOVED us slowly, slowly, across the salt sea, while night careat wheel overhead and the stars

"My old spirit seems to knohere we are," Ga up at the panoply

"He’s been studying the stars for years now"

"Where are we, then?"

"A hiding place A refuge" He pointed at three bright stars, arranged in a looping formation with four dimmer ones and a scatter of those barely visible The diht stars, red and intensely blue "That is the Greater Tiger See"--he dreith his finger in the air--"there’s the tail, dimmer than the eyes and teeth Human forces retreated here after Charum Hakkor This was our last front--forty prime cruisers, ten first-rate tuned platforer, then looked at me resentfuly Gamelpar chuckled and shook his head