Phylax Gig was a city boy, like our master Robenc, only from a different neighborhood. You probably don't know this — no reason why you should — but that assignment to guard Mountain House is regarded as something of a dog. For ordinary soldiers like me and the lads, it wasn't so bad, but for those with ambition — for an officer — it's a punishment to be sent there. Robenc wouldn't tell the likes of me what he'd been sent up the mountain for, but I suspect it was something to do with women, or the wrong woman — master Robenc would be rather thrilling to be seen with, don't you think? Especially to the bored young wives around the court — and maybe some not so young — but I'm only guessing.

Gig was a man of another stamp. He worked his way up; he was good-looking too, in his younger days, but as soon as he started to speak everyone turned up their nose as if he smelled bad. Except in the army, when he was out in the field: marching over rough terrain, sleeping out in the open, even fighting once in a while — he loved that, it made his eyes shine to talk about it. We never got the whole story, but it sounded like some commander cocked up and Gig had to take the fall.

That's the trouble with being an officer, as I see it: when you're low on the pole like Gig was, you have to pay for the incompetence of those above you; if you manage to get up there with the generals, you've got so much to lose that when you do screw up you can't afford to take the blame, so you dump it on some lieutenant who won't be missed. And when you have to do that, you've lost your soul. No, I'd never want to be an officer.

Gig should have known better than to let it eat away at him like he did. Like I said, he came from the less impressive part of town, where unfairness keeps a permanent address. He'd grown up with it, but he thought he got away — left that all behind. Finding out he was wrong about that made him drink.

And there really isn't much to do at Mountain House. You people aren't exactly our kind — we were just as happy to keep away from you as you were to be kept away from us. Gig never spoke to any one of you but the Superius Frater, and he tried to get out of that if he could. He was all right with us lads, and would sometimes get a little merry after a drop or two, but before long he'd remember his grievances and go off to brood.

Then one day — I think you were still a boy, or weren't there yet — one of our lads disappeared on patrol, then showed up by the spring same way Gig did later — in pieces. Only it wasn't some hysterical little brother that found him, it was Gig and me — we were paired on that shift.

There were always rumors. Some of them were believed, partly. But no one had actually seen... all that ever happened was that a body was found. Certain seasons of the year, certain types of weather... a long dry spell, or — just to be contrary — at the end of a long rain... near the spring, maybe, or at that place across from the House where the boulders spill across the path — just out of sight, close enough to smell, easy to find if you're looking for it, and have been on one of those damn details before, so you know where to look. Like me. I'd found two before this. But it was Gig's first, and it rattled him.

The story is there are things living in those rocks. Things that catch you out in the open, kill you in some horrible way, then leave what's left of you where it'll be found, later, once you've been missed, after the hunch sets in and we get sent out to find you. And not animal things, that kill you for food. We'd lost a careless brother from the House now and then to a big cat or a bear, but what we came across after was nothing like this.

No one's ever seen anything. Except the look on the face, and I never want to see what that face was looking at, or I'll be just as dead.

Gig did what every Phylax did when the thing happened. He set up an inquiry, talked to the brothers, grilled us lads something fierce. I wasn't the oldest there; that was Omper, and he said he didn't know anything — he was short-time, due to retire in a year, and was starting to get a little senile, or pretending to. I wish I'd done the same. But I was eager to help, because I'd taken a shine to Phylax Gig, looked up to him in a way, making his own way like he did, and all that. So I told him everything I could remember about the two I'd found, and other stories I knew from Omper and the lads from before my time.

At first I thought it was helping him, taking his mind off his own sorry fortune. But then he started gnawing on that all the time, just as he had on his wrongs, and I lost interest. It's the underling's life: nothing keeps the boredom away for long. Another poor soul disappeared a little later; Phylax Gig thought there might be a pattern and tried to figure it out. But he never did, and then that flurry died down too.

And then the Good Doctor came. Now that was interesting. Phylax Gig knew him from before, and felt the same way about him as you do, little brother. You ever see a terrier bristle when it sees a cat? That was how Phylax Gig acted if the Good Doctor so much as showed himself outside the House. And, as was his way, Gig began to brood on the Good Doctor, and convinced himself that evil man was sent all the way to Mountain House to spy on him.

I could never find out from Gig what happened when they knew each other before, but in my opinion the Good Doctor got sent to Mountain House for screwing up his own self. [And maybe he was a snoop at the same time, to win his way back, or something — you know how it is in this damned business, little brother, wheels within wheels.]

But that's when Gig began to lose his grip. Somehow the Good Doctor, just by being there, made him crazy, and Gig started staying out all night, drinking and shouting, wandering sometimes miles from the House. The lads and I spelled each other looking out for him, though there were times when I wished he'd just stumble over one of those cliffs and put an end to his misery. But he was sure-footed as a mountain goat, even dead drunk, and sometimes, when I was trying to keep up with him, he'd just disappear off the trail, and I'd have to give up and go back.

Then one day I was on patrol with Gig in the late afternoon. He'd stopped speaking for more than a month, so I was surprised when he told me out loud that we were on a special mission that day.

"Mission, sir?" I asked.

"We're going to follow the Snake to his back door."

"Yes sir. And which snake would that be, sir?"

He looked at me with an patient smile. "I've been protecting you boys. The others are too stupid to understand, but you, Aric, you've always got something going on behind your eyes, I've seen it."

I didn't know whether that was good or bad, so I just said, "Yes sir." Seemed the only safe thing.

"We'll wait near his hole until he comes out, then we'll follow him."

By then we were a couple miles from the House, at a place where the lower trail comes up to meet the main road, not far from the Gate. He pulled me across the ditch and scrambled up a rock face that looked to me to be smooth as glass. But then I saw his toeholds and slowly made my way to the top.

Gig was lying on his stomach, peering over the edge. The road was twice my height below, but no one walking there would think to look up to our perch unless he knew someone was there, and even then the ferns and laurel were plenty thick. I lay down beside him on the moss.

"When he comes," Gig said, "be still as death. He'll know he's being watched, but he won't see anything up here as long as you don't move. Look."

He pointed down at the brightly lit curve of road around the rock we were on top of. When I looked, his shadow waved its hand at me from the middle of the pool of light — the sun was directly behind us, and I could easily make out the shapes of our heads.

Suddenly Gig hissed at me and pointed up the road. Someone was coming, wearing the habit of a brother. None of the rest of you ever wandered this far from the House without an escort, but this hiker came right on as if he was going somewhere, on purpose. And then I realized it had to be the Good Doctor, and so it proved to be. As he got closer, Gig looked at me once, mouthed "Don't move!", then went back to watching, like a cat in the tree where the bird-feeder's hung.

The instant the Good Doctor stepped into the pool of light, Gig reached over to me in an exaggerated way and put his hand on my arm. As I started to turn toward him, he squeezed. The Good Doctor had seen the movement in the shadows on the ground, and looked up, trying to find out where it came from. Gig sqeezed my arm harder; neither of us breathed. The Good Doctor looked again at the shadows on the ground, then back up at us.

"Who's there?" he said, his gaze shifting suspiciously. He couldn't look towards us for very long, the sun being right in his eyes, and after a long moment he muttered something and was on his way again. As soon as the Good Doctor's back was to him, Gig pitched a hand-sized rock into the woods on the opposite side of the road. The Good Doctor wheeled, eyes wide, scanning everywhere around him. With the sun no longer right in his eyes, I was sure he'd see us, but in a moment he turned away and resumed his course.

At that moment Gig let out a noise I've never heard coming from a human being before. It was a sort of screech, very quiet but piercing. The Good Doctor stopped dead, staring at the cliff face before him. I realized that Gig had aimed right at that wall, so the Good Doctor must have thought the sound came from in front, but nothing was there except a blank slab of rock.

The Good Doctor started on his way again, but now was shying at every sound, from bird calls to the rustle of little critters in the leaves. I felt Gig shaking, I thought from the strain of his grip on my arm, which was beginning to hurt. But then I realized he was laughing, and I got scared myself.

The Good Doctor went around the bend, still looking watchfully all around him, and then was out of sight. I let my breath out in a rush.

Gig hissed at me fiercely. "Not yet." He pulled me back from the ledge and we scurried a few yards along the plateau, following the curve of the road. I knew that just around that bend was where the way rises up between two little cliffs to head for the Gate, and figured we were going to ambush the Good Doctor before he got there. Gig threw himself down on top of the next overlook, pulling me down beside him.

I expected the Good Doctor would come around the bend at any moment, but a long time went by and he didn't show.

Gig put his ear to the ground, listening intently. At last he stood up. "Gone," he said.

I was amazed. "But where?"

"That's what we're going to find out, my little stratiotés." He started tramping towards the place where the road came level with us.

"Could he have turned back?" I asked.

"Why? Because a squirrel scolded him? I think not. Let's go back to where we last saw him."

Once on the road, we headed towards the House. There wouldn't have been any footprints, since the road there is rocky and dry, so we looked along both sides to see where the Good Doctor might have stepped off.

We arrived at the spot beneath our first hiding place and looked up. Gig laughed out loud. "He looked right into my face!" he shouted. He stomped the ground and hugged himself in glee at having scared the Good Doctor. He didn't seem to care that the man had just vanished.

But I did, and began to look more closely at the dust and weeds along the berm. Maybe there was some secret opening in the rocks beyond, but I wanted to eliminate the more sensible possibilities first. The side of the road next to the bluffs we had perched on showed nothing. The other side was just as blank at first — the rocky woods sloped down toward what I knew was the northern cliff face, that dropped off hundreds of feet into the valley below — but then I noticed a broken popweed stem near a boulder that looked like a giant brain, and went over to inspect it. Sure enough, on the ground right next to the popweed was a fresh heel print, pointing towards the boulder. I stepped in that direction maybe ten paces and came around a shoulder of rock, and there my breath left me.

Before me was a "room" in the rock about as deep but not so wide as one of your cells in the House. In its far wall was another opening that I was sure led deeper into the rift. When I got up close I could feel a wind blowing out of it, cool but sharp with some animal's smell. That was far enough for me. If the Good Doctor wanted to hide in a bear's cave to get away from us, he was welcome to get away from us.

I wondered whether or not to tell Gig, who was still dancing and whooping back on the road; then I decided it was my duty to show my commander the popweed, the heelprint, and the cave. What he decided to do then was not for me to say.

When he saw the opening, Gig's nostrils went wide and he grinned like a cat, panting — I swear I saw his ears go back. At the mouth of the deeper fissure I tried to stop him, saying it would soon be dark and we should be getting back. He looked at me for a half dozen heartbeats with those mad eyes and then went straight into the cleft without a word. I heard him grunting and scrabbling for a moment, then it was silent.

Now I was in a spot. I knew I could not follow him. The stink of the place! My legs simply would not move me any deeper into that dark rock. So I shouted that I was going back to the House to take care of the shift change; he could do whatever he wanted. I waited as long as I dared, then ran back to the road, but went towards the Gate instead of taking the shorter route along the lower way. The sun had already touched the bluffs; I needed to get back into the light, onto the broad main road with the open sky above it.

From that day on, Gig spoke not another word. He turned up sometime during the night, though not to sleep — some food was gone from our mess, but his bunk was taking on dust. In fact, I didn't see the man himself for days, and when I did it really disturbed me. He'd slept in his uniform, if he'd slept at all; his hair and beard were full of burrs. That was when he started chasing the brothers with his axe.

I wasn't due to pull a shift with him for a week yet, but I traded cycles with Omper, who said it scared him to be anywhere near Gig, he'd gone so wild. On duty Gig seemed almost — well, tame — but it was creepy. We tramped the trails and checked in at all the usual places, and he only growled under his breath from time to time. But I could talk my head off and he wouldn't even look at me.

Something was badly wrong with Gig, but who among us knew what to do? I tried to get to the Superius Frater, but the Good Doctor always got in between — he was back at work like he'd never left — and after that I ran out of ideas. And from then on, we sort of got used to him. The only trouble he made was chasing a little brother now and then, but even that didn't happen very often, and it didn't seem as if he was serious about hurting the boy, only wanted to scare him, have a little fun.

We wanted to think that, so we did. We wanted to think that he only did it when he was drunk, so we did. But it wasn't true — you yourself know it wasn't true. When he caught you that time by the Gate, I don't know what it was stopped him from splitting your face open for you, but that wasn't playing. And at least one of those brothers you lost when he "fell off a cliff" was dead before he went over the edge, I'll be bound.

And then Gig himself disappeared, only to show up that fearful way a sennight later. Like the others before him. The day they brought his pieces back, old Omper just took off his uniform and walked into town. I saw him the other day, sitting in a doorway in the sunshine, smiling and drooling like a baby. He's happy now. He tried to get me to go with him, and I regretted it after that I didn't. Like I'm doing now. If this great rescue doesn't work out, I'm going his route.

So then Robenc showed up, and another damn investigation began. I tried to avoid the to-do as best I could, even asking for double shifts to make up for Omper's being gone. What I really wanted to do was to stay away from that Good Doctor. Even if he had nothing at all to do with Gig's death, he sure loved the uproar it caused. And I know he was spying — once you know to look for it, it just can't be hid. Best thing, if you can manage it, is to keep from coming to such a person's attention.

Well, the investigation got nowhere. The answer was staring master Robenc in the face, just like it did with Gig and the Phylax before him: there's something out there. The more I thought about it, the more I came to doubt that it was a bear that lived in that cave the Good Doctor disappeared into. Gig followed him in there, and when he came out he wasn't a man any more. Maybe the Good Doctor wasn't a man himself. Another reason to stay the hell away from him.