Tunnels 02, Deeper

kind of royalty at the top of the Styx hierarchy, but this was pure speculation. The Styx lived apart from the people of the Colony, and so nobody knew for sure what went on, although rumors of their bizarre religious rituals were bandied about in the taverns in low whispers, growing more and more exaggerated with each telling.
    As she looked from the girl to the old Styx and back again, Sarah caught herself thinking that they could be related in some way. If the hearsay was to be believed, the Styx didn't have traditional family units, the children instead being taken away at an early age and raised by designated guardians or headmasters in their private schools.
    But Sarah felt that there was definitely a bond between the two of them as they sat there in the dark. She sensed some sort of connection that went beyond the Styx's allegiance to each other. Despite his advanced years and his inscrutable face, there was the vaguest hint of the avuncular about the old Styx's manner toward the young girl.
    Sarah's thoughts were interrupted by a single knock on the door of the hansom cab. It flew open. A blindingly bright lantern shone rudely in, the glare making Sarah shade her eyes. Then came an exchange, in reedy clicks, between the younger Styx by her side and the lantern bearer. The light withdrew almost immediately, and Sarah heard the clanking of the portcullis as the Skull Gate was raised. She didn't lean over to the window to watch, but instead pictured the pig-iron gate as it retreated into the huge carved effigy of a skull above it.
    The gate's purpose was to keep the inhabitants of the huge caverns in place. Of course, Tam had found myriad ways around this main barrier. It had been like a game of Chutes and Ladders to him; each time one of his smuggling runs was discovered, he always managed to find an alternative route to get Topsoil.
    Indeed, she herself had used a route he'd told her about to make good her escape, through an air-ventilation tunnel. With another pang of loss, Sarah smiled at the memory of the scene as the big man, with his bearlike hands, had painstakingly sketched her an intricate map in brown ink on a square of cloth the size of a small handkerchief. She knew that particular route was useless now -- with typical Styx efficiency it would have been closed off in the hours after she'd fled to the surface.
    The carriage surged forward, moving at an incredible rate, descending deeper and deeper. Then came a change in the air, and a burning smell filled her nostrils, and everything began to vibrate with a pervasive low rumble. The carriage was passing the main fan stations. Hidden from sight in a huge excavated space high above the Colony, massive fans churned away, day and night, drawing off the smog and stale air.
    She sniffed, inhaling deeply. Down here, everything was more concentrated: the smoke and fumes from fires; the smell of cooking, of mildew and rot and decay; and the collective stench of the huge number of human beings segregated in several interlinking, albeit quite large, areas. A distilled essence of all life in the Colony.
    The carriage made a sharp turn. Sarah gripped the edge of the wooden seat so she wouldn't slide along its worn surface and into the younger Styx at her side.
    Closer.
    She was getting closer.
    As they continued down, she leaned expectantly forward to the window.
    She looked out, no longer able to stop herself from gazing at the twilight world that had once been the only one she knew.
    From this distance, the stone-built houses, workshops, storefronts, squat places of worship, and substantial official buildings which the South Cavern was composed looked very much the same as when she'd last seen them. She wasn't surprised. Life down here was as constant as the pale light of the orbs that burned twenty-four hours a day, week in, week out, for the last three centuries.
    The hansom cab raced off the bottom of the incline and through the streets at breakneck speed, people stepping out of the way or pushing their handcarts quickly against the curbs so as not to be mown down.
    Sarah saw Colonists regarding the speeding carriage with bewildered expressions. Children pointed, but their parents pulled them back as they realized that the hansom was carrying Styx. It wasn't done to stare at members of the ruling class.
    "Here we are," Rebecca said gently. "Come with me."
    She took Sarah's hand, guiding the quaking woman out into the dimness of the cavern. As she allowed