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once, his heart began to race and a dull pounding thumped at the front of his forehead. But both faded
quickly, leaving him much relieved. The snake had been true to its word.
He reached the far bank without incident. Soon the character of the landscape began to change
radically. Instead of desert, or flat fertile plains, or river bottom, unchecked vegetation overwhelmed the
land. He had entered true jungle, a riot of crackling greenery and noisy creatures. Such places had been
only a rumor to him, as they were to anyone who had been raised in the dry, barren country to the south.
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As he strode along beneath the towering boles he marveled at the variety and shapes of the growths that
closed in around him. Who would have thought that the world contained so many different kinds of trees,
so many varieties of vine, so many strangely shaped leaves? The plethora of insects that flew, crawled,
and hopped within the forest was equally astonishing.
He had no trouble walking. The tallest trees spread their uppermost branches wide, blocking much of
the sky and keeping the light from reaching the ground. There, the competition for life-giving sunlight was
intense among seedlings and saplings. Gomo and his troop would love the place, he mused.
There was no trail. No traders came this way, no farmers tilled fields this far north of Kora Keri. He had
to make his own way. That was a prospect that did not trouble him. It was something he had been doing
all his life.
Brilliantly tinted birds whistled and sang in the branches, dragoneels cawed, and small, uncivilized
primates rustled the treetops. While watching them, he kept a sharp eye out for snakes and insects on the
forest floor, where downed logs and accumulating litter made it hard to see the actual ground. Stepping
over a rotting log, he was careful to avoid the bristly fungi that had sprouted along its degenerating length.
Some mushrooms and toadstools were toxic to the touch, he knew, while others provided shade to tiny
intelligences whose whimsical approach to existence he did not want to have to deal with right now.
A second, larger log lay ahead and he had prepared to clamber over it as well when he saw that it was
not a log. Slowing his approach, he reached out to touch the mysterious barrier. To his left it extended as
far into the forest as he could see, while in the other direction it eventually made a sweeping curve
northward. A splotchy grayish white, it was gouged and battered along much of its inexplicable length.
At first he thought it was made of some kind of stone, but up close he could not find a place where
individual sections had been mortared, cemented, or otherwise fitted together. The surface was rough but
not pebbly. About five feet high and flat on top, it was slightly wider at the base, giving it a triangular
shape.
Who had built such a redoubtable structure in the middle of the jungle, and why? Looking around, he
saw no evidence of other construction; no crumbling temples, no imploded homes, no collapsed
warehouses. The ground offered up soil, leaves, fungi, insects, dung, and other organic material, but
except for the wall, there was not a hint of artificiality. Not a shard of rock, shattered lumber, or
disintegrating brick. There was only the winding, smooth-sided, unaccountable barrier.
Despite the damage that had been done to it, it was largely intact, giving evidence of considerable
engineering skill on the part of its makers. Turning to his right, he followed its length until he came to a
place where a foot-high section had been gouged from the top. The exposed interior revealed fine gravel
in addition to the compositing material itself.
The break offered a slightly easier place to cross. Looking down the length of the wall, he considered
following the rightward curve until it no longer blocked his way north. Or, he thought, he could cross the
wall here and save a little time. Placing a hand on either side of the break, he boosted himself up, put his
feet down in the modest gap, and stepped through.
The air changed. The forest, abruptly, was gone. And the shrieking organisms that ignored him even as
they surrounded him were like nothing he had ever seen before.
A lesser man would have panicked, would perhaps have gone running out into the howling herds to be
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instantly trampled to death. More poised than most of his kind, Ehomba froze while he tried to take stock
of his surroundings. Facing the utterly unexpected, he knew, was not unlike confronting a rampaging
mammoth. Best to stand motionless, appraise the situation from every possible angle, and hope the wind
was against you.
Given the chaos into which he had stepped, it was not an easy course to follow.
The very air itself stank of unnameable poisons. Reflecting its composition, it was as brown as the
backside of a brick kiln. Barely visible through the haze, buildings taller than Ehomba had ever seen or
heard tell of towered into a blistering sky through which the feeble disk of the sun struggled to shine. Then
he saw that the raging herds of wailing creatures that surrounded him on all sides were not animals, but
vehicles.
Whatever pulled them was invisible to him. Their roaring was continuous and unrestrained. That, at least,
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