Chapter 23

"Move it, move it, move it!" instructed Ripred, herding them all from the open bank and into a tunnel. He forced them along for a few minutes until they were well out of sight and, hopefully, out of smell of the tunnel entrance. At a small chamber, he gave the order to halt. "Stop you. Sit you. Slow your hearts."

Wordlessly, the remaining members of the quest sunk to the floor of the tunnel. Gregor sat with Temp, his back to the others. He pawed up Temp's back, found Boots's hot little fingers, and entwined them with his own. He had almost lost her. Lost her for good. She would never have had the chance to meet their dad or get back to his mom's arms or play in the sprinkler with him and Lizzie or do anything ever again.

He did not want to look at the rest of the questers. Every one of them would have watched Boots and the crawlers fall into the river to stop the rats. He had nothing to say to them.

And then there was Tick. Brave little Tick, who had flown into the face of an army of rats to save his baby sister. Tick -- who never spoke much. Tick -- who shared her food. Tick -- who was after all just a roach. Just a roach who had given all the time she had left so that Boots could have more.

Gregor pressed Boots's fingers against his lips and felt scalding tears begin to slide down his cheeks. He hadn't cried, not the whole time he'd been down here, and there had been plenty of bad stuff. But somehow Tick's sacrifice had crushed whatever thin shell remained between him and sorrow. From now on, he felt an allegiance to the roaches that he knew would never fade. He would never again take a roach's life. Not here and not -- if by some miracle they made it home -- in the Overland.

He felt his shoulders began to shake. Probably the others thought he was ridiculous, crying over a roach, but he didn't care. He hated them. He hated them all.

Temp, whose antennas had drooped down over his head, reached out and touched Gregor with a feeler. "Thank you. To weep when Tick has lost time."

"Boots would weep, too, if she weren't..." Gregor couldn't go on as another wave of sobs swept over him. He was glad Boots hadn't witnessed Tick's death. She would have been upset and she wouldn't have understood it. He didn't really understand it, either.

Gregor felt a hand on his shoulder and jerked away. He knew it was Luxa, but he didn't want to talk to her. "Gregor," she whispered sadly. "Gregor, know you we would have caught Boots and Temp if they fell. We would have caught Tick, too, had there been any reason."

He pressed his hand against his eyes to stop his tears, and nodded. Well, at least that was a little better. Of course Luxa would have dived after Boots if she'd fallen. The Underlanders didn't worry about falling the way he did, not with their bats.

"It's okay," he said. "I know." When Luxa sat beside him, he didn't move away. "I guess you think it's pretty stupid, me crying over a roach."

"You do not yet know the Underlanders if you think we lack tears," said Luxa. "We weep. We weep, and not just for ourselves."

"Not for Tick, though," said Gregor with a trace of bitterness.

"I have not wept since the death of my parents," said Luxa quietly. "But I am thought to be unnatural in this respect."

Gregor felt more tears slipping down his cheeks when he thought of how badly you had to be hurt to lose the ability to cry. He forgave Luxa everything at that moment. He even forgot why he needed to forgive her.

"Gregor," she said softly when his tears had stopped. "If you return to Regalia, and I do not... tell Vikus that I understood."

"Understood what?" asked Gregor.

"Why he left us with Ripred," said Luxa. "We had to have a gnawer. I see now he was trying to protect us."

"Okay, I'll tell him," said Gregor, wiping his nose. He was quiet for a minute, and then he asked, "So, how often do we give Boots that medicine? She still feels pretty hot."

"Let us dose her now, before we move on," said

Luxa, stroking Boots's forehead. Boots murmured in her sleep but didn't wake up. They slipped a few more drops from the bottle between her lips.

Gregor stood up and tried to shake off the pain. "Let's get going," he said, not looking at Ripred. The rat had been in tons of wars. He'd probably seen lots of creatures killed. He'd told Gox to eat Treflex. Gregor was sure Tick's death affected him as little as ... well, as swatting a roach affected people in New York.

But when Ripred spoke, his voice lacked its usual snide tone. "Take heart, Overlander. Your father is nearby."

Gregor lifted his head at the words. "How nearby?"

"An hour's walk, no more," said Ripred. "But so are his guards. We must all proceed with extreme caution. Bind your feet in webs, speak not, and stay close behind me. We had rare luck at the bridge. I do not think it follows us where now we go."

Gox, whom Gregor was beginning to appreciate more as time passed, quickly spun thick silk slippers to pad their feet. As Gregor held his flashlight for Luxa to put on her pair, the light faded. He dug in his pack and came up with the last two batteries.

"How much longer can your torchlight last?" Gregor asked Luxa. He had noticed they'd gone to one torch when they met up with Ripred, apparently to conserve fuel. Now the one torch burned low.

"A short time only," admitted Luxa. "Your light stick?"

"I don't know," said Gregor. "These are my last batteries, and I don't know how much power's left in them."

"Once we have your father, we will not need light. Ares and Aurora can get us home in the dark," said Luxa encouragingly.

"They're going to have to," said Gregor.

The questers regrouped. Ripred led with Temp and Boots behind him. The tunnel was large enough for Gregor and Gox to walk beside them. Aurora and Ares fluttered along next, making short, silent flights. Henry and Luxa brought up the rear on foot, swords drawn. Ripred gave them a nod and they started off, deep, deep into enemy territory.

They tiptoed along, scarcely daring to breathe. Gregor froze every time a pebble moved beneath his foot, thinking he had triggered another rat assault. He was very afraid, but a new emotion was rising up in him, giving him strength to keep putting one foot in front of the other. It was hope. It flowed through him, insisting that he break his rule. His father was nearby. He would see him soon. If only they could keep moving forward undetected, he would see him soon.

When they had been creeping along for about half an hour, Ripred suddenly stopped at a bend in the tunnel. The whole party pulled up behind him. Ripred's nose twitched furiously and he crouched.

A pair of rats sprang from around the bend. In an impossible move, Ripred tore out one's throat with his teeth while his back feet blinded the second. In another flash, both rats lay dead. No one else had had time to raise a hand. Ripred's defense confirmed what Gregor had suspected the first moment he'd looked in his eyes. Even among rats, Ripred was lethal.

Ripred wiped his muzzle on one of the dead rats and spoke in a whisper. "Those were the guards to this passage. We are about to enter open space. Stay against the wall, single file, for the earth is unstable and the fall immeasurable." Everyone nodded numbly, still stunned by his ferocity. "It's all right," he added. "Remember, I'm on your side."

Around the bend of the tunnel was the opening.

Ripred made a right turn, and they peeled off in single file behind him. A narrow path led along the side of a canyon. When Gregor shone his light into it, he saw nothing but blackness. "And the fall is immeasurable," he thought.

The ground under his left foot, the one closest to the void, crumbled and sent a shower of stone and dirt into the darkness. Gregor never heard it hit the bottom. His only consolation was that Aurora and Ares were inching along somewhere behind him, ready to save anyone who fell.

After about fifty yards they reached the more solid ground that fanned out from one end of the canyon. A natural arch of stone framed a wide road, worn smooth by many rat feet. Ripred picked up speed as they crossed under the arch, and Gregor felt that any protection the terrain had given them was gone.

Ripred, Temp, Gox, and Gregor raced down the road. Luxa and Henry had instinctively taken to the air. Gregor felt as if rat eyes must be burning at them from every crevice.

The path ended abruptly at a deep circular pit with walls as smooth as ice. A faint light burned in the pit revealing a furry creature hunched over a stone slab, fiddling with something. At first Gregor raised a warning hand. He thought it was a rat.