The Eye of Zoltar

‘It shall be so,’ he said. ‘You will consult with our accountant, Pugh the Numbers.’

One of the neater warriors climbed off his Buzonji as Geraint remounted his, and after Geraint had told us we were ‘the guests of the Siluri’, they were all gone, leaving the Princess to explain her complex marketing plans in detail to Pugh the Numbers.

It was almost an hour before we were back on the road again.

Cavi homini

‘That’s kind of weird,’ said the Princess once we had driven a mile or two down the road in silence. We had dumped the trailer and freed the goats, so although still cramped in the jeep, we were at least a little faster.

‘What’s weird?’ I asked. ‘There’s a wide choice out here.’

‘The quantity of goats involved. Pugh the accountant said that Skybus Aeronautics gave them two thousand goats a month as payment for mining rights at Cadair Idris.’

‘What were they mining?’

The Princess shrugged.

‘He didn’t say. But because the contract was well drafted, they couldn’t convert the goats into something more usable. At least, not until now. I think the Goat Marketing Board will be a serious earner for the Mountain Silurians. It might even civilise them.’

‘You did say that peace would be brought about only through economic means,’ I observed.

‘I did, didn’t I?’

We reached the farthest extent of the wooded area a half-hour later, and Addie pulled into the shade of a large lime tree. We climbed out to consider our next move.

‘There’s at least a mile of open country to the base of the mountain,’ said Addie, peering at the landscape through binoculars, ‘and we must be cautious – a lot of people have vanished travelling this way.’

I looked up at the sheer grey mass of Cadair Idris, the top swathed in clouds, and saw, for the first time, that one side of the rocky pinnacle seemed to have the remnants of a stairway cut into the stone. The road upon which we were parked led to the mountain, then branched to where we could see that some buildings had been constructed beneath the almost vertical southern face. They seemed quite new, too. I nudged Perkins and pointed. He spelled himself a hand telescope again and stared for a moment at the distant buildings.

‘Several large buildings,’ he said, ‘and a barbed-wire perimeter with lots of people milling about. Looks like a manufacturing facility of some sort. The Skybus truck has just arrived and the gates are being opened to allow it to enter.’

‘Manufacturing?’ I said. ‘Out here?’

‘Looks like it. With a sizeable workforce, too, but they’re too far away to see details.’

‘Someone not subject to the hundred per cent fatality index, at any rate,’ I said.

‘Pugh the Numbers called them Cavi homini,’ said the Princess.

Addie laughed and I asked her what was so funny.

‘It’s like Cloud Leviathan graveyards and Sky Pirate Wolff and the Eye of Zoltar – myths. The Cavi homini are spooks, bogles, mysterious men without morals, or form. They take what they want, and nothing can kill them. It is said they are only empty walking clothes, with nothing inside. The translation from Latin is—’

‘Hollow Men,’ I said with a shiver.

‘Yes,’ said Addie with a frown. ‘You have these fairy stories in the Kingdom of Snodd as well?’

‘No,’ I said, ‘we’ve got them for real, as have you. We call them drones. They are used by …’

I stopped talking as several pieces of a large and very unseen jigsaw puzzle that was hovering above me locked into place. The Mighty Shandar used drones, owned a large share of Skybus Aeronautics, and here in the empty land near Cadair Idris, Hollow Men were manufacturing something for Skybus and then shipping it out in the trucks we had just seen.

‘Addie,’ I said, ‘just what did you see in the back of the Skybus truck?’

‘Nothing,’ she said, ‘it was completely empty.’

‘It couldn’t have been,’ I said. ‘They come in heavy and go out light – you said so yourself.’

‘I did say that, yes. The empty lorry I saw was one of the heavy ones being driven in.’

‘Then there’s less than nothing in the light ones going out?’

Addie shrugged.

‘I don’t get it,’ said the Princess.

‘Sometimes when magic and the Mighty Shandar are involved,’ I said, ‘it’s better not to know the truth.’

‘Jenny, I’ve found the half-track,’ said Perkins, who had focused his fingerscope on the side of the mountain where I had seen the stone steps.

‘And?’

‘The vehicle’s empty, but halfway to the top I can see a small figure – Curtis. I’d recognise that bandana anywhere. What do we do?’

‘Do what we planned and climb Cadair Idris,’ I said, ‘by way of the steps, preferably.’

‘And the Skybus facility and the Hollow Men?’ asked Addie.

I shrugged.

‘They’re what – two miles away? I say we worry about them if they start heading our way.’