Samiha's Song

by Mary Victoria

  The guards accompanying Tymon and Pallas went down on one knee before the man in purple, as if he were a saint. The girl named Jocaste removed her face covering. She was young, Tymon saw, and surprisingly ugly beneath the mask: a dark scar crossed the left side of her face, mangling one eye and drooping down her cheek like a tear.

  ‘Doctor,’ she murmured. ‘These two came from afar, as you predicted.’

  ‘Of course they did. And you brought them to me. What would I do without you?’ he answered, raising the two young people to their feet, and patting their shoulders like a doting parent.

  ‘Please, sir,’ Tymon tried again, with mounting anxiety, ‘you’ve put us in a bit of a bind. We have to be somewhere. Without our dirigible, we’re unable to travel—’

  ‘Such a shame,’ interrupted the Doctor with a slow shake of his head. ‘But I could not let you go your way without at least trying to help, you know. The thing you were riding in was no dirigible. You had come under the sway of a demon, whatever innocent shape it seemed to possess in your eyes. I saved you. Of course, you do not realise it yet! But one day you will, you will. The lost ones shall bow their heads, yea, and return repentant to their old home, even at the end of the world.’

  He laid a hand over his heart as he recited his scripture. Tymon could not tell if he was mocking them or believed sincerely in what he said. The Doctor spoke with the clipped accent of a city dweller and used an oddly old-fashioned turn of phrase. If he had originally hailed from Argos city he had not been back there for many years. There, was something loose and slippery about the purple-suited man, as if he were a lunatic, a dangerous felon, or both. Tymon shivered, his instincts clamouring for him to leave, but there was nowhere else to go.

  ‘Here, you’ll learn to live in harmony with the Sap,’ continued the Doctor, with a gleam in his eye. ‘Here, you’ll live the natural life, the one you were meant to live. Follow the example of Anise and Jocaste while you get settled in. You’ll thank me one day for your deliverance.’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ exclaimed Tymon, annoyance getting the better of his caution. ‘We can’t stay with you, we’re in a hurry—’

  ‘Though we are grateful for offer,’ added Pallas. He, too, must have sensed the Doctor’s madness, for he flashed Tymon another warning look. ‘My friend means this: since you destroy our machine, perhaps you help us go where we need?’

  ‘A foreigner,’ mused the thin man, blinking curiously at him and sidelining the question yet again. ‘From the East, no doubt. Well, well. It makes no difference to us. Our little community does away with spurious distinctions like that. We’re all children of the Tree. You are welcome among us.’

  ‘We told you, we can’t stay,’ ground out Tymon, as Pallas stared helplessly at their extraordinary host. ‘We have to get to Argos city before the Tree Festival—’

  ‘Argos city?’ interrupted the Doctor, his smile vanishing. ‘Why would you want to go there?’

  He seemed genuinely distressed; he hopped over to Tymon, reaching out a trembling hand to fawn at the young man’s tunic.

  ‘You mustn’t go to that terrible place,’ he pleaded. ‘It’s a vulture’s nest, full of lifeless, unnatural things. Please. Stay with us.’

  ‘Now you’ve upset him,’ cried Jocaste, as she hurried to the Doctor’s side. ‘Why do you talk like that?’

  She wrapped a protective arm about him. The man in purple rested a gaunt cheek against her breast, whimpering in distress.

  ‘Like what?’ objected Tymon. ‘Those are the facts. We’re going to Argos city.’

  His words drew renewed groans from the Doctor. Jocaste steered her charge into the tent, whispering to him soothingly. Anise bent his taloned neck toward Tymon.

  ‘You two: inside,’ he hissed, indicating the tent with a brief jerk of his head.

  They followed Jocaste unenthusiastically through the doorway into the pink-and-white candied light of the pavilion. The interior of the tent was crammed with an assortment of furniture and effects, in what looked to be a bedroom, workshop and study rolled into one. The two armchairs and upholstered sofa were piled so high with books they were unusable, while the trestle table at the centre of the pavilion sagged under a heap of maps and navigational instruments.

  Jocaste led the Doctor to a couch in one corner, sweeping aside loose sketch-leaves to help him onto the rumpled pillows. Not one surface in the place remained free and uncluttered. By the main worktable sat the only empty chair, a high-backed article with a carved headrest shaped like a saint’s halo. Tymon had just noticed, with a prickle of discomfort, that the chair was fitted with sturdy leather arm restraints, when he was distracted by a sound like a dull crack. To his alarm, he saw Pallas crumple down unconscious on the floor beside him. Before he could turn to face his attacker, however, a blow had hit him squarely on the side of the head and he too fell in a heap at the feet of Anise.

  The Jay man put his club back in his belt with a grunt of satisfaction.

  ‘This time it’s going to work, Father,’ said Jocaste, stroking the Doctor’s brow as he lay on his bed. ‘You’re going to be cured.’

  ‘Which one do we start with?’ asked Anise.

  ‘That one,’ mumbled the Doctor feebly, pointing a finger at Tymon. ‘That one.’

  Tymon awoke to a blinding headache, opened his eyes and took in the jumbled chaos of the pavilion. There was no one in front of him; he could not turn around to check behind for he was tightly held in place by leather bands across his chest, wrists and ankles.

  He was in the Doctor’s chair.

  ‘Why am I tied up?’ he croaked, indignant. ‘What’s going on here?’

  ‘Ah, my dear fellow, you’re back at last!’ cried a voice. The Doctor’s mop of white hair appeared, peering over Tymon’s right shoulder, followed by his manically grinning face. ‘Apologies for the bump on the noggin. There was no other way of convincing you to accept my invitation.’

  The Doctor was alone: the other Jays had evidently left the pavilion. His captor did not seem in the least feeble in the absence of his helpers. His eyes were as bright as ever. From the lift and sway of the floor and the snap of sails outside, Tymon guessed that they had dropped moorings.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked, craning nervously up at the Doctor.

  The thin man was adjusting some contraption above him, outside his field of vision. Tymon heard a scrape of hard wood and winced as a cold band was placed across his forehead and two cold knobs touched his temples.

  ‘Just tuning you,’ his host announced. ‘Pruning you. Won’t hurt a bit. Two degrees, perhaps … No, no, that’s too much. What am I thinking? One degree is quite sufficient …’

  The Doctor’s ravings reminded Tymon of the Oracle, though he had no illusion that his opponent wished to train his character.

  ‘Why—’ he began.

  Intense pain erupted in his skull, obliterating speech. He could only grip the arms of the chair as liquid fire passed through him, joining the points on his temples and extending across his forehead. A strangled moan escaped his lips.

  ‘Green grace,’ exclaimed the Doctor, making an adjustment to the contraption he had placed on Tymon’s head. ‘I am so very sorry. Half a degree. There. You’re awfully sensitive. Now, let’s see what we have: well, these are excellent readings, I must say.’

  The pain receded. Tymon’s body was bathed in sweat and he trembled. He stared in horror at the madman bending over him, wondering how he had called a torrent of burning fire into his head and switched it off again, like a spigot in the bathhouse. Would his attempts at a rescue end at the hands of a torturing maniac?

  ‘An exceptional sensitivity,’ crowed the Doctor, unaware of the reaction he was provoking.

  He danced over to his worktable and snatched up one of the objects Tymon had initially taken for navigational instruments. It was a set of three interlocking circlets, together forming something like a collapsible helmet. As he lifted them up Tymon caught a brief,
reflective flash. The rings were lined with bands of a polished material that gleamed in the filtered light of the tent.

  ‘Orah,’ he breathed aloud, in spite of himself.

  ‘Yes, yes, the treasure of the Ancients,’ said the Doctor. ‘You really are seminary educated, aren’t you?’

  He retrieved a three-legged stool from behind the burdened couch and perched himself in front of Tymon, his knees poking up on either side of him like a grasshopper. He leaned forward, holding the rings and smiling as if he were about to let the young man in on a wonderful secret.

  ‘This stuff here was the key to the Old Ones’ power,’ he gloated. ‘The secret of an entire civilisation. And the cause of its downfall, no doubt, for they would have wanted more: oh yes, much more.’ He shook with unpleasant laughter. ‘They used it to collect what they called “the Sap”. That’s not the Will of the Tree, or whatever mumbo-jumbo the priests taught you at school. It’s the generating energy of the universe, plain and simple. With it you can cure a thousand ills or extend your lifespan tenfold.’

  He turned his attention to the circlets, humming gleefully to himself. They were adjustable and engraved with degrees and other odd markings about the circumference. The base circle was equipped with two flattened knobs like the ones that pressed into Tymon’s skull. The Doctor carefully set the position of each ring in relation to the others.

  Tymon guessed that he had been fitted with a similar contraption containing a single ring, for the band over his forehead certainly felt like orah. A twisting knot of dread built up in his stomach as he guessed that his jailer had somehow obtained relics of the Old Ones, akin to the ‘orah-clocks’ the Oracle had told him about. He wondered if the Doctor might not be the false prophet mentioned by Noni. The memory of the pain in his temples testified to his adversary’s insanity. He needed to break free of his bonds, and quickly.

  ‘You’re right,’ he blurted out, in a bid to gain time. He had noticed that the restraint on his left hand was slightly looser than the one on the right; given a chance, he might be able to work the slack over his hand. ‘The priests know all about orah. I’ve seen my tutors using it. Is that where you got those circlets? At the seminary?’

  The Doctor appeared to take the bait. ‘Of course not,’ he scoffed, pausing in his task to glance at Tymon. ‘We found them in the World Below.’

  ‘What?’ Tymon ceased worrying the strap in surprise. ‘You mean you’ve crossed the Storm? I thought no one had done that for a hundred years!’

  The thin man smiled, but did not answer him directly. ‘Not in a hundred years,’ he crooned, gazing lovingly at his circlets. ‘And they were willing to throw it all away.’

  ‘Who was willing to throw what away?’ snapped Tymon. He did not enjoy drawing out his opponent, but could think of no other way to stall him. The leather over his wrist was as rigid and unyielding as wood.

  ‘As soon as I saw them, I knew,’ breathed the Doctor. He was talking to himself now, nodding in feverish agreement with his own story. ‘Greatest discovery of the millennium. Not to be wasted on those superstitious fools. “Knowledge is all”, eh? And now you want to destroy what you’ve found? A travesty! I took them. I saved them.’

  He placed the three circlets on top of his head. As the device came in contact with his bald crown, the air was filled with a barely perceptible hum. Tymon felt the answering tug in the ring clamped to his own skull as if it were drawn to its fellows. The band across his forehead grew hot, as did the pendant hidden under his collar, and a wave of nausea passed through him. Whatever the Doctor was doing was akin to the misuse of the Grafting power.

  ‘You don’t need the orah!’ he protested, in desperation. ‘A Grafter can speak to the Sap without all this stuff.’

  ‘Come on now, we’re beyond all that mystic claptrap, my boy,’ replied the Doctor, waving away his objections. ‘We both know the Sap doesn’t talk. It’s a force, an element like fire or lightning. We use it.’

  ‘It talks!’ Tymon gasped as the throbbing in his temples increased. ‘You mentioned special gifts: you’re right. I’ve Seen the Sap. I’m a Grafter. If you let me go I could do a trance for you — I could ask whatever question you like about the future. What do you want to know?’

  ‘The future?’ echoed the other. ‘Why would I want to know about that?’

  Tymon realised, in horror, that his companion’s face wore an expression of ghastly pleasure. A dark flush had suffused the Doctor’s cheeks.

  ‘You’re stealing it!’ cried Tymon, with belated comprehension. He strained against the chair.

  ‘Now, now,’ sang the thin man. ‘I only take what I need. You have a surfeit: I have a lack. It’s only fair that we should share.’

  He leaned forward, intent on his prey. With physical proximity the rings’ power increased. Tymon felt as if his very core were being extracted. There was a definite shimmering in the air above the Doctor’s head, the bright torrent of Sap visible to him, as it had been during his experience on the Envoy’s ship. He gritted his teeth against successive waves of nausea. The Doctor’s eyelids drifted shut in beatitude.

  ‘Oh, that’s good. Very good. You’re quite something,’ he said.

  Tymon could not bear the thought of being feasted upon like a dumb herd-beast stuck with parasites. He was already weak, his reactions slower than normal. He twisted his hands beneath the straps until the skin on his knuckles bled. The Doctor lolled forward.

  ‘You,’ he giggled, ‘are going to keep me in juice for a month.’

  Tymon yanked his left hand free with a supreme effort, ignoring the wrench of torn skin, and reached out to grab the rings off the Doctor’s head. Just as his fingers brushed against them, his opponent snapped back and scraped his stool out of reach.

  ‘Oh no you don’t,’ he slurred, wagging a bony finger at Tymon. ‘No tricks, now. Or I shall have to be cruel.’

  He leapt up and wove around the side of the chair, taking care to stay clear of Tymon’s free arm. The young man fumbled frantically with the strap on his right wrist but it was too late. The Doctor had already changed a setting on his headpiece: the pain in his skull abruptly intensified until he could no longer move or speak.

  ‘It would be a shame to waste all that good juice,’ he heard the madman whisper, in his ear, before blackness swallowed him and he knew no more.

  Tymon came around briefly to the sensation of being moved. The faces of Jocaste and Anise bent over him as he was lifted from the chair, his muscles seized with paralysis. He could not stir when the two young people left him to sprawl alone on the floor. Instead he stared up in bleary astonishment at the summit of the Doctor’s chair, which had been invisible to him before. A wooden covering on the back of the seat had been removed, revealing a disc fashioned entirely of orah and carved with a magnificent, stylised Tree. In blinking disbelief, Tymon recognised the classic shapes of the Leaf-Letters woven into its branches. The disc would have formed a bright halo about the head of anyone sitting there. He groaned and strove in vain to speak when he saw the two Jays drag Pallas into the tent. They forced the struggling youth into the chair.

  ‘What have you done?’ cried the Nurian, hoarsely. ‘Putar! Crazy! You call us devil? I make you pay, Maza Sav!’

  Tymon watched Jocaste leave her associate to finish strapping the fuming Pallas to his seat and bend over the Doctor, now languishing on his bed in a renewed front of weakness.

  ‘Father?’ she whispered. She took one of his limp hands. ‘How do you feel?’

  ‘Better,’ he said, gazing up at her with a brave smile. ‘The pain has lessened. I would so much rather my benefactors were volunteers, though.’

  ‘They would be, if they knew you like we do,’ she replied ardently.

  The last thing Tymon saw, before he lost consciousness, was the vision of the young girl leaning down to kiss the madman’s crop of dusty hair.

  PART THREE

  CROWN

  End signs, fire times.

  East
and west, pass the test

  North and south, through the Mouth

  End signs, fire times.

  — Argosian children’s rhyme

  24

  This should not be happening yet, thought Tymon. The trial was not supposed to be for another two weeks. It was not supposed to start until the Tree Festival. Why had the priests moved it earlier? He desperately elbowed his way through rank after rank of spectators on the temple steps in an attempt to reach the Hall. All Argos city had gathered outside the building to await the Kion. She was either just about to arrive for her trial, or had already been and gone; Tymon did not know which. All he knew was that he could not see her anywhere, and the lack of her was a torment.

  A moment later, the dream shifted and he was no longer battling the crowd but pushing through branches, stumbling out of the Tree of Being into the wide grassy expanse beyond. The wind was sharp on his cheeks and smelled of green. There was no sign of the dead Focals sitting in the tangle of branches above him. He turned with a cry and plunged back into the Tree, scrabbling past leaves and twigs to search for the face of the girl he loved. She was not there. He could not find her anywhere in the universe. He awoke, whimpering like a wounded animal and blinded by a wash of light in his eyes.

  He was lying on the floor of a small shed, hands and feet tied with rope. Late afternoon sun welled through gaps in the slatted walls and shone full in his face. About him were an assortment of odd objects he could not immediately identify; when he turned his face from the blinding light he realised they were props, dusty robes and stiff paper crowns of the sort used in theatre productions. Memory returned, slowly and painfully. He was in the clutches of the mad Doctor, depressingly far from Samiha. A choking sense of urgency filled him. He must reach her. He must escape from the Jays. Everything depended on it.

  He raised his head, listening intently and wondering what had become of Pallas. No sound came from outside the shed. He guessed that the barge had been anchored in the leaf-forests for he did not feel the lift and sway of the vessel. His limbs were no longer paralysed though the bonds made it difficult to move. He hoisted himself up slowly, leaning against the wall.