He was exhausted. Covered in sweat and dust. Mennvinn picked a few shards from his face and wiped the cuts clean. "You need to rest."
"I can’t."
"Let someone else take over."
So Emyr took the hammer without a word and against Mennvinn’s protests. He whimpered as he climbed, his broken ribs no doubt an agony. But he attacked the wall all the same, just one small slip from falling and hurting himself. "Be careful," Tom told him.
"I would say the same to you," Mennvinn told him. She peeled back his shirt and a foul waft struck Tom’s nose. "This bite is getting worse," she muttered. She disappeared and Tom couldn’t muster the interest to see where she went.
"You look awful."
Tom lifted his head just enough to see Six had sat himself nearby. "You say the nicest things."
"I’m not the only one who doesn’t lie." Six grinned without humour. "When was the last time you ate?"
When they broke camp? Before they’d entered the maze? He couldn’t remember. Answering was too much effort, so he just shook his head.
Someone held a flask to his face. "Drink." Mennvinn tipped his head back and poured water into his open mouth. Emyr’s teeth, why did he feel so weak?
"He should eat, too,” Six said.
"Not hungry," Tom answered, and coughed as he inhaled water. Once he was done, he tried to pull his shirt back on. "Cold."
Mennvinn’s hand on his forehead was like a burning coal. "He has a fever." She poured something on his shoulder that stung.
"Will that be enough?" Six asked.
"I don’t think so."
"I can’t stay," Tom told them. It was getting too cold, and too hard to think. But if they could find the end of the maze, find Orlannu, they could leave. He could gather his thoughts, and rescue Katharine and Rose. "I have to keep moving."
"You need to sleep."
"I can sleep after we get out of this place."
"That could take days."
"Isn’t there anything you can give him?” Six asked her.
"I have something that will make him sleep."
Tom reached up and placed a hand on Mennvinn’s shoulder. "You are a good healer," he told her. It was hard to put his words in order. "I am very grateful for what you’ve done for us. For me. But if you make me sleep, I will kill you."
Shock and fear were plain in her eyes. Then she pushed them aside, and she was again calm and in control. "You could die," she told him.
No. He would not abandon Katharine and Rose to Faerie forever. “Then I don’t have time to sleep."
Emyr was climbing back down. "I need a moment," he said, his voice tight with pain.
"I’ll take over." Tom pushed himself to his feet, tottered, warded Mennvinn away with a wave of his hand. "I can do it." He reached deep, where the dark stone within him sat cold and unmoved by his unsteady legs, his fatigue, his weakness. That’s what he needed to be right now: hard and uncaring of every complaint his body levelled at him. He picked up the hammer, not because his body had the strength to do so, but because he willed himself to do so. He climbed the wall and didn’t tumble to his doom because he refused to fall. Hammered new handholds and footholds because they would save Katharine and Rose.
But the body was weak. And soon he felt his grip weakening, despite his furious demands on his fingers to hold fast. So he stopped. Better to drop the hammer when he willed it, rather than let it slip free and hurt someone below.
By the time he reached the ground his whole body was shaking, and he was happy to let Emyr take over and to let Mennvinn urge him to the cool stone beneath him.
An old woman was being pushed through the Cairnagan dungeons while Glastyn watched with interest.
Kobolds were chewing the bricks in a city wall, giggling at the thought of its collapse.
Idris knelt alone in front of Eirwen’s tomb, head bowed, and muttered, "I have been a fool."
Hands lifted his head and placed his folded shirt beneath it. Tom almost protested; while his mind was elsewhere, it wasn’t in his body. He closed his eyes and shivered.
"Make him sleep," Six murmured. "I’ll bear the consequences."
"He won’t," Tom muttered. "I’ll make sure of it."
"You asked me to take care of everyone," Mennvinn countered.
"Will sleep cure me?"
Silence.
"Then what good will it do?" But Eirwen’s grace did he want to rest. He could already feel sleep claiming him, his thoughts tattering and disordering into blissful dreams. Tom clenched his aching thighs, took a deep breath, tried to order his thoughts. "Tell me how close Emyr is."
"Close." Six sounded resigned. Good. Arguing was a waste of time. "But he’s tiring."
Tom readied himself to rise, to climb, but he couldn’t. Not yet. "Dank. Can you take a turn?"
Silence. So Tom opened his eyes and lifted them to Dank. The other man stood apart from everyone else, and Tom could see he was still nursing his shame. He stared at Tom like a rabbit spotted by a wolf. “Please,” Tom said. He didn’t have the energy to reassure the other man. He just needed him to help. “I don’t care about what you did. All that matters is what you do now.”
Dank looked down as his hands, hands that had killed Ambrose, hands that hadn’t been raised against Rimestenn. But now wasn’t the time for wallowing in the past. “Help me, Dank,” Tom said. And Dank took a deep breath, lifted his eyes, straightened and said, “Yes, Sir Tom,” without any hint of mockery or malice. He accepted the hammer from Emyr, took a sure, certain path up the wall, as if he’d climbed it many times.
Emyr sat beside Tom, sweating and in obvious pain. But he was grinning. “Sir Tom,” he said. He watched Dank swing the hammer like a young man. He was a young man. And a very old man, too.
Tom’s thoughts didn’t make sense. "I’m not well," he muttered to himself.
"Just be glad we don’t have any mirrors," Six replied.
"How do we get back to Faerie?" Tom asked. Dank couldn’t do it; the last effort had trapped him in the maelstrom between realms. So they would need a fay to help them. Would Glastyn do it? No. "He won’t risk Melwas’ wrath. Not for me."
Something cool and wet was placed on his forehead and it was bliss, a balm, "Thank you," he said.
"We need more than I have here," Mennvinn said.
“Face the problem you can solve," he told her.
"You are my problem."
He shook his head. "No. Katharine and Rose."
"They’re not here. You are."
“Yes.” Tom sighed. “That’s the problem."
"He’s delirious."
"I don’t think he is."
And before Tom could correct any of them, Dank called out. ”I’ve reached the top." Tom forced himself to open his eyes and smiled to see Dank stood on top of the wall, hands on his knees, panting, hammer resting at his feet. He pointed off to his right and grinned like a maniac. "I can see the centre. It isn’t far."
"Don’t mean much in a bloody maze, boy," Jarnstenn grumbled. "Can’t believe I’ve got to climb up there."
"Would you rather I went?" Six asked.
But rather casting an embarrassed at Six’s missing leg, Jarnstenn instead grinned and said, “Course not. You’d only make a hash of it."
Six smiled too. ”Get us out of here, master dwarf,” he said, waving Rimestenn up the wall.
Jarnstenn wasn’t a natural climber, and some of the craters they’d made in the walls were a stretch for him. He slipped twice, and each time Tom expected him to fall and dash his brains out. But he made it up the wall, pulled out his paper and his inks, and began to sketch like his life depended on it.
Which it did. "We move as soon as they come down," Tom told the others.
"You’re no good to them dead," Mennvinn murmured to him.
“That’s why I need to hurry."
"Got it!“ Jarnstenn waved the paper over his head. He and Dank began to descend, and Tom pushed himself to his feet. He was shaking all over and the world sp
an as he straightened. No. He was going to hang on a little longer. He touched the dark stone within. He was hard and cold and still. Calmness of the soul until death.
Jarnstenn was almost at the bottom when he slipped and fell, landing with a thud and a groan. What now? Mennvinn rushed to his side and Jarnstenn snapped, "It’s fine, it’s just my wrist."
She had his arm in her hands, squeezing and pressing as he cursed and groaned. "It doesn’t feel broken. It might be sprained."
"We need to move," Tom told them.
"Give me a bleeding moment here."
"I don’t have a moment, Jarnstenn." His thoughts threatened to wander away. "I’m sorry you’re hurt. But you can walk. And we’ll be able to look after you once we get out of here." He waved a hand at Emyr. "Take the map, take the lead."
Emyr did as he was told, and soon they were all trudging through the maze again. Rimestenn was less of a threat with only one arm and one leg, but everyone was still tired and uneasy, hungry and thirsty. They kept telling Tom to stop, to rest, and Tom waved them away. Even when they told him they had to sleep, he said, no, not yet, sleep once we’ve escaped, there isn’t time to stop.
Visions intruded on his sight, not foresights, not in this place. Motion at the edges of his vision, glimpses of children running, Degor and Rose, playing hide and seek. He grinned, waved at them, they played so well together, he truly was blessed. He turned to Katharine and said, "She’s a good girl."
Elaine said, "Degor’s so proud to have a little sister."
"I’m proud of him."
"He’s strong and honest and good."
"Nothing like me."
"Nothing like you."
Their laughter seemed distant, far away. "Don’t wander off," he told them. "Don’t get lost."
"Degor’s already missing," Elaine said.
And Katharine added, "And you’ve lost Rose too."
"At least you’re here."
"She went to look for them," Elaine said. "I’m the only one who waited for you."
"I’m sorry," he muttered, hugging himself against a sudden chill. "I’m sorry."
"This is all happening again."
"No." He shook his head. "I won’t let it."
"Then don’t let it."
They turned a corner and bright light washed Elaine away. The maze opened up into a courtyard, empty save for two figures in its centre, framed by a flower crafted in glass that glowed from within. One was a statue of Eirwen, rising from the ground beneath their feet in an effigy of black stone marbled with silver-grey. She was stood, eyes closed, smiling, beautiful, cradling something in her hands. Her features were sharp and precise, unlike the sarcophagus in Cairnagwyn. Here, she seemed almost alive.
The second figure laid at her feet was Rimestenn. Face down. Remaining hand resting on her feet. Still. Silent. Dead?
"My love." Emyr’s smile was pleasure and pain in a torturous tangle. Tom almost expected the statue to open its eyes and reply.
But it was Rimestenn who moved. Looked over its shoulder and let out a mournful cry. He began a slow, awful crawl towards them. Still trying to protect Orlannu. It was gut-wrenching to watch. Rimestenn had given up so much. His life, his thoughts and body and mind, to the point that all he could remember was that he needed to stop anyone he saw.
But Tom had no time for pity. He swung the hammer in an overhead blow, and Rimestenn screamed as Tom kicked aside the pulverised arm, dropped the hammer and staggered to the statue.
Up close, Tom could see that Eirwen’s smile was playful. Even wicked. As if she had played a great joke on them all. And she had. She held only a small jar made of the monolith stone.
This, Tom knew, was Orlannu. No mighty tool. No great weapon. Just a tiny cauldron. He lifted it from Eirwen’s grip with gloved hands. This could never have saved Katharine’s life. And it couldn’t help him bring her back. Tom felt suddenly old and tired, as if he was ready for a wind to blow him away, but the wind wouldn’t come.
”Who has the sprite?" he asked, holding Orlannu out for someone else to take. He had no interest in it. How to leave? That was all that mattered.
There. A door behind the statue. No handles or hollows or signs of magic. Just a doorway. He leant against it and pushed, revealing a long dark tunnel.
"Come on," he said to the others.
"A moment," Emyr replied.
"I don’t think I have a moment to spare.”
"He was my friend!" Emyr was knelt beside Rimestenn, who gnashed and thrashed at his king. “Look at what he’s done to himself. For me.”
Tom looked at Emyr, at Draig’s arm in a sling, at Dank’s now-flawless skin, at Six’s missing leg. Emyr was right. These sacrifices deserved honouring. But the world wavered, drifting out of focus. He didn’t have time. "Say goodbye,” he said.
Emyr gave Tom a nod. "Go." He placed a hand on his friend’s ruined head and the remains of Rimestenn stilled. "Be at peace.”
"Dank, with me," Tom demanded. He hefted the hammer as best he could. It was heavy, but he didn’t dare face Melwas without a weapon of some kind.
The tunnel was long. He kept brushing against the walls, but it was like he had no thoughts left to snatch. He saw things, yes. He saw Regent talking to a shadowy figure, he saw Gwyllion at the gates of Cairnarim. But he also saw Degor and Rose running ahead of him. He heard Elaine’s voice muttering something to him that he couldn’t make out. He felt someone take his arm, heard Dank’s voice but couldn’t make out the words.
The only light came from what little could squeeze past them from Eirwen’s statue, so they almost walked into the final door. Tom leant against it, but it was Dank that did most of the work, pushing it on ancient hinges that groaned as fresh air rushed over them and they staggered out of the mountain.
The smell of salt in the air. The feel of sun on his face. Sand beneath his feet. And a rush, as if someone had been holding him down, and now he was released.
“Tom?”
He dropped the hammer. He couldn’t make his fingers work.
“Tom!"
His legs buckled and hands grabbed at him as he dropped to his knees. "No," he said, his lips numb, his tongue thick. He reached out, help me, but the world was too dark, he couldn’t see anyone there, he felt sand on his face, in his mouth, he couldn’t catch his breath, please, don’t let this be it, please, not yet, not yet, I don’t want to go.
But his body rattled and failed him. And Tom died.
Chapter 25
There was no pain. No thirst. No fever nor chill. He opened his eyes and there was light. He wore the simple clothes he’d taken with him when he’d left Cairnagan, but they were soft like silk. He looked down at his bare feet, over which swirled the fog of the Between. For a moment, he didn’t understand. Had the fay brought him here?
No. He remembered now. He knew why he was here.
"Hello, Tom." Glastyn wore a simple white robe, his dark hair unbound and spilling over his shoulders. His expression was tight, like he was in pain.
“Hello, Glastyn.” Tom looked about, but there was no-one else. ”I was expecting torture."
"What is there to torture?" Glastyn waved a hand at him. “This isn’t your body. You left that on that beach."
Of course. But then, "What is it?" He looked down at himself, touched his chest, half-expecting his fingers to pass through his skin. But he felt solid. Real.
"The same as all of this." Glastyn encompassed it all in a glance. "It’s whatever you think it is."
Tom frowned, but the fog was already clearing, blowing away to reveal grass underfoot, grass richer and greener than any he’d ever seen. He looked up and saw a beautiful blue sky, not bright enough to dazzle, just clear and gorgeous. Glastyn took a place next to him as the hilltop revealed itself beneath them.
"I died," Tom said, and a crushing disappointment almost dropped him to his knees. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
"You did." Glastyn sighed. "It wasn’t what we hoped for."
&nbs
p; "I’m sure the fay can torture my spirit."
"That isn’t what we meant." Glastyn’s words were so sombre, his manner so still. It unnerved Tom.
"So what happens now?"
"That is up to you."
"Something tells me that isn’t true."
Glastyn smiled and shrugged. "Shall we sit?" He lowered himself into a seat that wasn’t there, and a moment later he was encased in a glass chair, almost identical to Emyr’s throne in Cairnagan. Glastyn looked it over and nodded. "Interesting." He gestured for Tom to sit in the second throne that had appeared beside his.
It felt like treachery to sit. To accept a comfort from the enemy. But what use was there in fighting now? It was over. He’d lost.
"Winning a fight only means achieving the goal you set out with," Glastyn said. He waved a hand as if there was a glass in it, and one appeared a moment later. Glastyn grinned and raised it in a toast, sipped it, sighed his satisfaction. "And a fight isn’t lost if no-one achieved their goals."
"A fight can be lost by all contestants."
"In order to win, someone has to lose. In order to lose, someone has to win." Glastyn raised his glass again. "Shall we toast?"
A glass appeared in Tom’s hand too, filled with an amber liquid. "I won’t drink Faerie food."
"You’re not in Faerie, Tom. Not yet." Glastyn grinned and quaffed his drink. The liquid changed colour every time Tom looked at it.
"Then where are we?"
"You tell me."
A breeze picked up, clear and pure, and Tom let his eyes follow the dirt track down the hill towards where he knew he’d see a hut. His hut. The one he’d lived in with Elaine, before he’d come to Faerie. A small affair, round with a conical roof, a single room inside, befitting a man of his modest means. But the hut he saw had no gaps in the roof, no patched walls. It was perfect, and smoke drifted from a chimney that simply hadn’t existed at the time. Children played outside. Degor. Rose. Others. He heard Elaine calling to them.
"I’m home," Tom said.
"Are you?"
Elaine stepped out of the hut, looked up the hill and waved to him. She was dressed in a blue dress of rich cloth, jewels in her hair, and she was heavy with child.
The Realm Rift Saga Box Set Page 108