The Haven

         “We make for the pass.” Norba said over the comlink, glaring at Jarn. “When I’m interested in your opinion, I’ll ask for it.”
         “Why are you so averse to stopping for a few hours?” Jarn asked him.
         “Because unlike you, I’m actually interested in making good time to Monram. Thanks to me, we’re already six days ahead of schedule.”
         “Which is why taking a day or so to rest and restock won‘t make any difference. Norba, be reasonable about this. It’s four hundred degrees out here, and we’ve been on the move for eight hours. It‘s only three miles out of the way and, like it or not, we do need to re-” Jarn was cut short by Norba’s backhanding him across the facemask. Fortunately, the rubber seal around Jarn’s neck held, keeping the poisonous gasses of Rook out of his helmet.
         “There will be no more arguments,” Norba grabbed the front of Jarn’s tunic, pulling him close. “Especially not from you. Get to the back of the line where you belong.” Norba shoved Jarn backward.
         Jarn walked back to the rear of the caravan where his thryr waited and hopped back into the saddle. The creature looked longingly at the haven marker and made a low disappointed sound. Thryrs were beasts of burden that the Nomads had designed to survive on Rook, and could smell water from afar, even underground. Jarn patted the beast’s shaggy silver fur. “Sorry, no water this time around.” He said, “Maybe in a little while.”
         Jarn sighed and laid his magrifle across his lap. It was useless trying to argue with Norba. He was the caravan leader, and as such could do almost whatever he wanted. Although Jarn was supposed to have been the second in command, Norba regarded him as merely a hired gun and had relegated him to the rear position. This most recent altercation was only one of several the two had had and had sprung from Jarn’s suggestion that they stop at a haven, an underground oasis established by the Nomad Council as a rest point during long treks, that Jarn had spotted three miles east.
         The caravan trundled along, mounted Nomad tradesmen riding beside the large beetle-like transports that floated along above the ground. The shining silver transports were loaded with wares that the Nomads were hoping to sell in the Rookling city of Monram. If they made it to the city at all. Jarn looked over his shoulder, almost hoping to see something he could vent his frustration on. A pack of grendels had been stalking the caravan for the past six days. Now, however, there were none to be seen, only the red dirt scattered with red and black rocks. Jarn was frustrated but also somewhat relieved, one or two of the creatures were easy enough to deal with, but a pack of grendels could rip through a caravan in minutes.
         Jarn opened the outer audio sensors on his helmet. The two merchants in front of him were discussing the odds of a good sale when they reached Monram, along with how much money each hoped to make. The drone of the transports’ antigravity drives drowned out any other conversation, as did the crunch of boots and hooves on the scorched soil. Jarn looked past the two men, up past the head of the caravan. To the north loomed the Ramarh, a massive crater that stretched sixty miles from one side to the other. Korba’s voice came on over the public broadcast channel, “We’re ten miles from the Ramarh. We’ll make the pass within two hours.”
         An inhuman howl echoed across the plain from behind the caravan, and followed by a second from the west and a third from the northeast. The men froze. Those that had magrifles armed them, and those that didn’t have them wished that they did. Either the pack had broken up into three groups, or they were being hunted by three individual packs working in conjunction. Jarn opened the public channel again, addressing Korba. “We should make for the hav-”
         “Silence.”
         “Korba, I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but we’re practically surrounded. At least in the haven we’d have a place to fight from if need be.”
         Korba’s voice was thick with menace. “I said silence. We make for the pass.” He fell silent for a moment, then added, “When we reach Monram, I’m going to report you to the council.”
         “That’s assuming we make it there at all.” Jarn retorted. He would readily admit that occasionally he had a problem with authority that he had tried with varying degrees of success to rectify, but Jarn didn’t have any qualms about making his opinions known when those above him clearly weren’t using common sense.
         “Keep moving!” Korba now addressed the entire caravan.
         As the caravan neared the Ramarh Pass, a narrow defile in the enormous stone wall, the howling grew louder and more frequent. Several times, Jarn glimpsed fleeting movements out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned to fire, there were only rocks and dirt. The thryrs snorted nervously, and the men now openly questioned the wisdom of proceeding.
         The southern wall of the Ramarh towered two miles above the caravan, and Jarn scanned the ledges and crags anxiously. The pass looked like a black wound in the blood red stone, admitting no light. Korba opened the public channel, “See? We reached the pass in only an hour and a half.” He chuckled, “And you were worried.”
         One of the men piped up, “What do you mean ‘were’?”
         “I didn’t come all this way just to decide to take a detour.” Korba spurred his thryr onward, riding confidently into the pass, followed by a few other men. The moment the last rider following Korba entered the pass, several dozen tall, lean figures appeared seemingly from nowhere along the ledges above. Each one held a deadly looking spear.
         “Korba, get out of there! Grendels on the upper ledges!”
         Korba snorted, “Grendels have no self control. If there were any there, they would have-” Korba was cut short by his own gurgling scream.
         The monsters on the ledge hurled their spears down into the crevice and at the men out on the plain. The cries of the dying and wounded and the roars and howls of the leather-skinned monsters rang across the channels. The caravan had walked into an ambush.
The survivors retreated from the Ramarh, and the grendels bounded down the sides of the pass, as agile as demonic monkeys, and swarmed out to the crevice. The riders opened fire on the monsters, the magrifles rapidly firing and recharging. Jarn switched on the laser sight on his magrifle and drew bead on one of the leaders. The speeding steel projectile effectively nailed the beast to the stone wall. Jarn called out for the survivors to make for the haven. Those still in the saddle turned off of the caravan road and raced for the small stone building that protected the entrance to the subterranean oasis. The unmanned transports full of goods were abandoned. They would be there if the men made it back.
         The second and third packs of grendels now converged on the fleeing riders. Magrifles fired into the encircling horde, each bolt moving with enough force to tear through several of the beasts before stopping. Jarn looked up ahead between shots. The haven was near, perhaps half a mile. Steel bullets buzzed through the air, cutting through the monsters’ leathery hides. The grendels dropped back, still pursuing but following the riders from a safer distance.
         Jarn turned in his saddle and fired on the grendels every so often, giving them more incentive to keep back. After what seemed like an eternity, they reached the haven marker. The squat stone building stood hunched the before them. There was something odd about this one. A mag-cannon was mounted on the top of the structure, and behind that sat a man in a black cloak. A ladder allowed access to the roof from the ground, by which the man quickly descended and strode toward the caravan’s survivors. Jarn dismounted and walked quickly toward the man in black, “Greetings, friend. I’d love to stand around and chat, but if you haven’t noticed-”
         “You’re not welcome here.” The man said flatly. “You must find shelter elsewhere.”
         “Come again?”
         “You’re not welcome here.” The man repeated. “I have orders that no one is to enter.”
         Shots rang out behind him, and Jarn began to lose his patience, along with his temper. “Whose orders would those be? The laws state that no one is to be denied entrance into any haven at any time for any reason. Unless you’re prepared to fight off thirty desperate men, I don’t see how you can stop us from going through an unlocked door.” With that, he pushed past the man and strode to the door. Pressing his hand to the pressure pad, Jarn waited for the door to open. It didn’t.
         From behind him, the man said, “The door is locked. The pressure pad has been disabled, and I have the only key.”
         “Well, in that case,” Jarn replied, “would you be so kind as to please open this door before we’re all torn to tiny pieces and eaten by grendels?”
         “No. My orders are that no one is to enter.”
         “Whose gave you those orders?”
         The man apparently knew his job a little too well; his orders had obviously pushed out any kind of thought other than ‘no one is to enter’. “The Margravine has ordered that no one-“
         “Is to enter. Yeah, I got that part.” Jarn snapped.
         “Jarn, they’re coming back!” One of the men, Rinlar, said over the main channel. The shooting intensified. Behind the defensive line the men had formed, the thryr’s lowed and shifted apprehensively.”
         Jarn promptly decided that the time had ceased for being cordial about this matter. Highlighting the man’s facemask with the magrifle’s targeting laser, he said, “Either give me the key or open the door.”
         “And I suppose you’ll shoot me if I don’t.” The man chuckled. The distinctive click and buzz of a magrifle arming answered him.
         “Now is probably the worst time you could choose to suggest that.”
         Rinlar had overhead the dialogue and now stole up stealthily behind the black cloaked man. Catching Jarn’s eye, he motioned to Jarn to act like nothing was wrong. He raised his rifle, and smashed the butt into the back of the man’s head. The man crumbled into a heap. Quickly, the two men searched the man’s garments, and finally found the key hidden in pouch sewn into his cloak. Rinlar checked the man’s pulse, “He’s alive, but he’s going to wake up with a bit of a headache.”
         Jarn opened a link to the entire group, “The door’s going to be open in a minute, begin pulling back. If any of the thryr’s run off, let them go. They’re not worth losing lives over.” A chorus of affirmatives rang back over the link.
         Jarn slid the key into the lock, and a green light flashed. The heavy steel door slid open, wide enough to allow for even the thryrs. Sensing water and safety, the animals turned and hurried, orderly all the while, into the haven. There was a special area set aside for them, and the thryrs followed special scent markers down a wide sloping tunnel that led to it. The men backed slowly into the haven, still firing shots into the approaching grendels. Jarn and Rinlar were the last to enter, carrying the unconscious man between them.
         When the door had closed and sealed, the ventilation system activated, sucking the poisoned air out of the room and leaving clean air in its wake. As the men shed their survival gear, they began asking why it had taken so long to get in, what the hold up had been, and other related questions.
         “I don’t know,” Jarn replied, “but I’m going to find out.”
         At the rear of the entrance area was another door, and it was through this that Jarn now went. When he reached the bottom of a long spiral staircase, he was met with an unexpected sight. Twenty men, all dressed either in black or bright orange, stood lined up before him. In front of them, a short, fat woman dressed in noble’s garb glared at him. “What is the meaning of this?” she demanded.
         “I was about to ask the same thing,” Jarn replied coolly, “miss…?”
         “Margravine Chandar.” She replied, stressing her rank. “You have no right to enter here. This is my property.”
         “Excuse me? This place is a haven, set up and regulated by Nomad tribal laws, and thanks to you...” Jarn could hear his voice wanting to raise itself into a bellow and he stopped himself. He took a very deep breath and said “And we very nearly died out there. With respect, Magravine, you have no authority to deny anyone entrance. We need to rest for a day or so and refill our supplies, then we‘ll be on our way”
         “No,” the margravine said, placing her hands on her hips. “That is unacceptable. Your troubles are of no concern to me.”
         By now the rest of the men had entered the room, each eyeing the margravine with suspicion. Jarn took another deep breath and replied, “Ma’am, I’m fully prepared to make them your concern if I need to. Where’s the communication uplink, please? I need to contact the settlement at Monram and inform them of the situation. The caravan leader and around twenty others have been killed by grendels.”
         “My uplink is in the central chamber. But you can go no further. In fact, you must leave. Now.”
         Undaunted, Jarn moved toward the door to central chamber, followed by the rest of his men, and one of the cloaked men made the mistake of rushing toward him. Losing his temper briefly, Jarn subdued him with a right cross to the face. He raised his hand toward his men. “No.” Jarn took a moment to regain his composure, and then looked down at Margravine Chandar, “My apologies. The uplink, Margravine. Now.”
         The margravine glared at Jarn again and waved the men aside. As Jarn and his men walked through, she said, “Don’t think you’ll have heard the end of this when you leave here.”
         Jarn turned and looked at the margravine. “You’d be wise not to think that either. I’m going to speak with Grand Councilman Rheaus as well.”
         Jarn tapped the pressure pad on the door and it slid open. The lush central chamber was a fusion of nature and technology. The uplink control panel, along with the haven’s main control panel, was embedded in the wall on his right. Large rocks had been carved and smoothed, providing seating. They could here the soft hum of the water manufacturing unit, sending water flowing across the bottom of the left wall and collecting in a small pool in the corner. Bright plants filtered the air and added beauty to the large chamber, and thick green grass carpeted the floor. He stepped through the door and walked over to the uplink panel. Activating the machine, Jarn keyed in the appropriate frequency and the static on the screen slowly cleared, revealing the Monram operator’s face. “Yes?”
         Jarn took a breath. “Councilmen Rheaus, please.”