The beetles halted.
"This way," said Kyla. Her hand gripped Haral's. In silence, he followed her further and further into the pylon's pitchy depths.
Now they walked on a strange, entangling surface that crunched brittly beneath their feet.
Haral flicked on his lance's illumination cell just long enough to glimpse the scene about them.
A prickling ran up and down his spine. For they walked a corridor of death, a passage carpeted with bones ... the bones of those who once had ruled this mighty city. A thousand skulls stared up at them, a hollow-eyed horror. Skeletons spread in heaps and tangles, rising on all sides like some rank, evil fungus.
Kyla's voice came through the darkness: "You wonder why we hate all aliens, warrior? Once, a thousand years ago, this was our proudest Shamon city. Then the first ships came out of space to Ulna. They hurled down bombs, and my people sought to hide here from them. But gas came with the bombs—a heavy gas, and deadly. It seeped into these ancient tunnels, and those who survived the blasts, the radiation, died by thousands—yes, by millions...."
The girl's voice broke.
Her horror, her pain, pressed in on Haral. But he dared not let himself think of them.
He said sharply: "This is no time for talk! Any moment, the coleoptera may be upon us. Those ships that passed above us, too—they may have been Sark's. If Namboina's told where Xaymar lies, Sark's men may beat us to her. If we're to find her first, we must go quickly—"
"Yes, quickly!" Again Kyla's trembling hand seized his. She led the way down a long, steep ramp, then on through what seemed endless blackness. "The old books say these tunnels end beneath the Triad. And then, below that—there lies our sleeping goddess, Xaymar!"