Nomi shook her head, but she seemed unwilling or unable to talk.

I know, he thought. Not gone. Just waiting. They know things have changed, and their purpose is dead. He wondered whether the Sentinels would be murderous or suicidal.

The sac started to move. The gash where he had sliced it puckered open, fleshy lips parting, fluid flowing, vapors dancing once again.

And Ramus bore witness to a great rebirth.

A SHADOW ROSE. Nomi could hear the sound of ripping, see the dark things emerging from the sac, scratching at the stone wall behind Ramus and the ceiling above. They were similar to the claws on those crab-things outside, but more complex, their shiny surface home to thousands of stiff hairs, joints silvery and almost metallic in appearance. Where they touched the walls, they carved deep scratches, and symbols began to take shape. The walls shook. The ceiling rattled, actually lifting up and down on the wall behind Ramus so that Nomi caught brief glimpses of the outside.

The ground shook, sending heavy ripples through the fluid that now covered the floor.

Ramus! she wanted to shout, but her voice had left her.

The thing rose before her old friend, colleague and enemy, and she could no longer see his eyes.

She looked up at the circular entrance hole. No faces there now, but she could see things falling from the cave's ceiling and hear the heavy splashes. Stone cracked, steam hissed and roared somewhere far off. The wall she was leaning against shook and she pushed herself away, but that did not lessen the vibration that seemed to move the air itself.

The Sleeping God was awake, the Fallen God had risen, and as it emerged from its place of rest, or prison, she could hear, above the sounds of the building and the cave beyond slowly destroying themselves, the creaks of its joints snapping back into use. It was vaguely reminiscent of the Sentinels' communication, and she wondered whether the God was speaking to them.

It heaved itself suddenly from the sack, reared up and placed several black limbs against the stone ceiling. It lifted and threw, and as it spun into the darkness, the stone slab cracked in two.

Nomi looked up, amazed, exposed. To her left, she could see where one of the fleshy pipes spanned the cavern, and molten rock now gushed from where it entered the cave wall. It sprayed down and out, and though she could not see where it struck the lake, she could see the clouds of steam rising up. The hissing was almost unbearable. She looked around, searching for where the other strange pipes led . . .

. . . and then she was no longer alone.