"We are entering the burial ground," I declared, touching the stone wall with the palm of my hand. The ... fortification was all I could think call it was recent and roughly mortared with local clay. That wasn't a good sign, clearly the introduction of las guns, and for all I knew, other tech, had already altered the local balance of power. Communal labor of this sort bespoke a significant change in the behavior's of the tribes. Had some local warlord risen high enough to command slaves to do this? At least it provided some shade, but as I pondered the likelihood of being crushed to death by rockfall, I decided this was of dubious advantage. At least my cover provided me with an air cooled body glove which saved me from the indignity of sweating like the others. I haven't always been able to choose high class covers, but I always try.

"Lucius, do you think you can get through without brining the whole wall down?" I asked.

"I will not be crushed," Lucius replied, which wasn't as close to yes as I might have hoped.

"The problem is simple engineering," Lazarus declared loftily, "I shall instruct Lucius Raj in which stones to remove." I was skeptical about this idea too. Lazarus and Raj had very different ideas about precision but Hadrian didn't object and I stood aside.

"Do you sense anything beyond?" Hadrian asked quietly as the Skitarii and the Thunder warrior went to work. I eyed the wall for a moment and then let my mind float outward. Almost immediately I brushed something. Crows screamed and took flight from the nearby hillocks, cawing and circling away to the north. I could taste death in my mouth, feel the wind peeling the flesh away from my bones.

"Are you ok?" Hadrian asked, his eyes alight with endearing concern.

"The valley is a bad place Hadrian," I told him quietly, "I'm not sure what is wrong with it, but there is something bad about it."


It took Lucius and Lazarus about half a standard hour to make a hole. The wall didn't collapse, though it did give something of a lurch as the last stone was removed and it settled slightly into its new consideration. I hoped through gingerly despite Lazarus' superior declaration that the wall was actually more solid now he had made his adjustments. The other side of the wall was markedly different. The valley grew increasingly rocky and bare. Ancient geological erosion had created projecting cliffs that stuck out from the valley wall at irregular intervals, like great granite teeth. On the smaller mounds I could see what looked like stella of some kind, though I knew from the archeor's reports that they were actually hollow logs that contained the ossified bones of the dead. Funerary rites varied across Havenos of course, but there was a marked preference for a lengthy decomposition followed by fetishizing of bones before eventually collecting them in logs, which were carved and painted according to their religious tradition. Only when the bones had been picked clean by predators and then ritually cleaned where they brought to the valley for final disposal. At first glance I could see a score of logs, some new, some ancient, clustered around slight rises in the ground like wooded hills whose trees had no leaves.

"This place looks haunted as frak," Clara declared, putting into words what we were all feeling, albeit slightly more crudely than some of us.

"Boss," Selenica said drawing our attention back to the way we had came. The back side of the wall was covered with bloody hand prints. Hundreds or thousands of them. Judging by size an shape there were at least a score of individuals represented and probably many more.

"If we are going to go this way," I muttered, "we need to move fast, and not just because of the moons."