by Jen Williams
He paused, looking ahead. The forest was growing darker and damper, and he could see tell-tale patches of black bark on the trees here and there.
‘The Wild,’ muttered Vintage. ‘I can smell it. Let’s be watchful now.’
‘You hardly need to remind me,’ said Tor. Although Ebora did not contain as many Wild spaces as the rest of Sarn, it was not untouched, and animals that had been corrupted by the worm people’s poisons could be very dangerous indeed. Despite all his posturing about the Ninth Rain, he had, of course, borrowed an old sword from the Finneral blacksmith, but it was a strange weight at his hip. He hoped he would not have to use it.
‘What happened to her, then? This Lanamond?’
Tor glanced at Noon. She was wearing a set of Eboran travelling leathers, recut to her size, with a pauldron capping her shoulder; it was a beautiful thing, made of pieces of a soft bronze-coloured metal, shaped like leaves. Under the bodice she wore a pale-green Eboran silk shirt, embroidered with yellow leaping fish. It was strange, to see a human wearing items that had once been made for Eboran lords and ladies, but he could not pretend they didn’t suit her. He looked away; things had grown colder between them since Origin.
‘She distinguished herself in the Fourth Rain, leading the very charge that sent the Jure’lia running back to their hiding places, and after that she became a kind of queen, in all but name. There’s a painting of her in the palace, hidden in one of the more obscure observatory rooms, and I’ve always thought she looked mildly put out – as though she didn’t ask for any of the attention.’
‘An obscure back room?’ Vintage frowned, stepping carefully over a sucking pool of mud. The forest was growing more unpleasant all the time. ‘If she was so celebrated, why is her portrait not on show?’
‘Ah, well. I’m afraid she fell from grace. In her later years, she became something of a diplomat for Ebora, travelling back and forth across Sarn, agreeing trade deals and acting as a mediator in disputes – things like that. Gossip began to fester about her though, while she travelled away from home. It wasn’t natural, it was agreed, that she should want to spend so much time with humans, that she should travel so far from the roots. Eventually, it was revealed that she was having an affair with one of Jarlsbad’s princes, and she was cast out of her role. There was a minor revolution – we’ve had a number of those too, but very little ever changes.’
‘Having an affair was enough to lose her her position?’
‘With a human?’ Tor raised his eyebrows. ‘Certainly. Imagine finding out that your most admired royal leader was having a torrid affair with a servant.’
‘The plains people don’t have royalty,’ pointed out Noon, ‘or servants. So that’s how Ebora felt about humans, then, is it?’
‘Servants is a polite way of putting it,’ said Tor, sourly. ‘Which makes the truth all the more delicious, doesn’t it? Half of me wishes all those old bastards were still around, so I could explain to them exactly what we found at Origin.’
Noon and Vintage fell suspiciously quiet at this, and Tor scowled to himself as they moved forward. Ever since the battle at the Tarah-hut Mountains they had been careful around him, as though he were a delicate vase that might shatter if they looked at it the wrong way. It didn’t help that he often felt like exactly that: a hollow thing, a construct that was ultimately meaningless.
‘Well, I for one hope she enjoyed her Jarlsbad prince,’ said Vintage eventually.
‘And the sword?’ asked Noon.
‘There was a big argument about it,’ said Tor. The forest had grown quieter, and instead of birds singing he could hear the faint rrrp-rrrp of frogs, and the busy whirrings of insects. ‘For a while it was thought that the Ursun Sword should go to whoever took over her position, but Ebora being Ebora, even her position looked likely to disappear with her. Eventually, it was forgotten, and until Vintage and I started rooting around in Micanal’s amber tablets, it was thought to be lost. Something like that, a piece of our history that is solid,’ he waved a hand to disperse a cloud of flies, ‘it could be inspiring. A reminder of what we can be.’
The normal forest had truly ended. All around, the trees grew taller and stranger, and even the shadows seemed deeper. A sharp, sour smell came from the pools of slippery mud under their feet, and a thick green moss covered the bottoms of the nearby trees like a virulent carpet. The sound of frogs was growing louder.
‘So? What happened?’
‘Micanal was intrigued enough to poke around, it seems. He discovered that Lanamond left Ebora and met up with her prince, and they lived together in secret for many years, until eventually he died. When she lost him, Lanamond returned and built a tomb for both him and her sword, somewhere out in the forests of Ebora. Once it was done, she left them both there, and became, according to Micanal, “a wandering hermit”, refusing to ever return to either Jarlsbad or Ebora.’
‘Here, look. What’s that?’
Ahead of them the ground dropped away, and they looked down into a boggy indentation in the forest, thick with puddles of greenish mud. In the middle of it all was a stone structure, made of marble that had once been white, but which was now stained with streaks of black mould and daubs of yellow and green moss. All around it small animals were moving, hopping and swimming through the mud and reeds. The whine of insects was back, stronger than before.
‘I suspect that’s our tomb, darling.’ Vintage moved to the front, her eyes bright, completely unconcerned by the mud. ‘Shall we have a look?’
They shuffled down the bank. As they grew closer, it was possible to see that the marble tomb had been carved with a leaping buck, its horns gradually growing into a wide spread of tree branches, complete with leaves sprouting from them.
‘The Jarlsbad prince,’ said Tor, nodding towards it. ‘His sigil was a leaping buck.’
‘What are these things? Frogs?’ Noon was scowling at the small green and brown creatures hopping away from them.
‘I believe so, my dear, although that one there is more rightly a toad.’
One of the things hopped on top of the tomb and glared at them with gold and black eyes.
‘The frogs on the plains are little green and orange things,’ said Noon. ‘We only ever saw them at the rivers. They were quite pretty.’
They reached the tomb and the toad shuffled away, dropping into the mud with a plop. Tor rested his hands on the edge of the cover, testing its weight and peering at the space where it met the main body of the structure.
‘Is there going to be a dead body inside that thing?’ asked Noon.
‘Only a very ancient one, Noon dear,’ said Vintage. ‘It’ll be all leathery and dry, I expect, or just a pile of bones. It probably won’t smell at all.’
Bracing himself in the mud, Tor crouched and pushed the lid, wincing as it screeched its way off the sarcophagus. A stench, so thick it was almost visible, rose up off the dark space within. Noon swore and stepped back, holding her nose.
‘Ugh. It definitely smells like someone died in there.’
Tor peered over the top. In the space within, there was a distinct lack of giant mythical swords. There were a few scraps of what might once have been fabric, and a rusted shape that could have been a belt buckle. And in the corner there was a large brown and green lump, about twice the size of a man’s head. It was splattered with mud and was glistening faintly in the daylight.
Noon appeared at Tor’s shoulder. ‘Is that the Jarlsbad prince? I’m not sure what she saw in him, to be honest.’
Tor scowled, suddenly violently irritated with the whole thing; with the stench of the bog, the muck on his hands from touching the tomb, Noon’s flippancy, the lack of any sign of the sword itself . . .
‘I don’t know what it bloody is,’ he snapped, ‘but it looks like Micanal’s notes were full of sh—’
The brown and green lump quivered and shifted, revealing a wide, wet mouth and a pair of huge golden eyes. Tiny front legs unpeeled themselves from the front of its b
ody, and its jaws fell open, revealing another set of puckering mouths nestling within its sizeable tongue. Tor got a brief glimpse of a pair of larger back legs, and then the thing was leaping at him.
‘Fuck!’
Abruptly, he was on his back in the mud, a huge weight on his chest and all the air knocked from his lungs. Vintage was shouting, and there was the soft wumph as Noon summoned her winnowfire. Horrified, Tor shoved the slimy creature off him, and scrambled awkwardly to his feet.
‘It’s just a worm-touched toad!’ he shouted, attempting to brush the filth and muck from his coat. The thing itself had scrambled off into a puddle, attempting to sink into it and vanish. ‘There’s no need to set anyone on fire.’
‘I’m not worried about that little bastard.’ Tor looked up to see Noon standing with her fists covered in green flame. Vintage stood on the far side of the tomb, her small crossbow held up and ready in both hands. ‘I’m worried about this ugly brute.’
Belatedly, Tor saw where they were both looking. What he had taken to be a thick confusion of rocks and foliage between a set of close-standing trees was, in fact, a much larger version of the thing that had jumped out of the tomb. Twice his height, a worm-touched swamp toad glared down at them with three times as many eyes as it should have had. Its body was broad and misshapen, lacking even the compact shape of a normal toad, and there were moving things all over it; tiny versions of itself crawled and hopped over its glistening skin. As they watched, it shifted forward, and the long wet crack that was its mouth fell open, revealing its awful, busy tongue.
‘I’m going to be sick,’ said Noon.
‘Perhaps if we just back away slowly, it’ll leave us be. Not everything worm-touched is out to eat us, you know.’ Vintage didn’t lower her crossbow, but she took a few steps backwards, boots squelching in the mud. The golden eyes of the giant toad slid wetly to follow her progress. Its mouth opened a little wider.
‘Vin, I don’t like the way it’s looking at you. Vin.’ Noon raised her hands. All around, the little frogs and toads began to croak and burp, as if in protest at their leaving. Tor drew his sword, feeling a flicker of discomfort at the unfamiliar hilt. ‘Vintage, maybe we should—’
The tongue shot out from between the creature’s lips, flying across the bog and striking Noon with terrible accuracy. She shrieked, and instantly she was in the air, flying towards the worm-toad’s enormous gaping mouth.
‘Noon!’
Tor ran, sword at the ready, but with a flash of green flame Noon was already falling back into the mud. The toad bellowed in pain, reeling its singed tongue back into its mouth while its stubby front arms writhed.
Noon was on her feet by the time he reached her, which was useful, as his chest felt oddly tight. He paused at her side, distracted by a strange burning sensation beneath his breast bone. Meanwhile, Noon raised her hands, a furious expression on her face. She shot off a barrage of fireballs, which landed hissing against the worm-toad’s skin. The creature shivered all over, wriggling backwards to get away from them.
‘Tor, I’ll have to use some of your energy.’
Tor, still distracted, opened his mouth to reply, but Noon had already taken hold of his hand, giving it a firm squeeze. The energy drain was like a hammer blow, and before he knew it he was on his knees in the mud again, his vision dimming at the edges. He blinked slowly, looking down at his sword where he had dropped it. He could hear the toad-thing croaking, and the crashing of something huge moving through foliage, but it all seemed very distant. Instead, there was a roaring in his head and a red-hot pain in his chest.
‘Tor? Tor, my darling, are you all right?’
Vintage’s kind face loomed into his field of vision, and he felt her hand on his arm, giving him a gentle shake. He pressed a hand to his chest, but the pain there was fading to an ember. With Vintage’s help, he clambered back to his feet.
‘By Ygseril’s damned roots, could you be a bit more careful, witch?’
Noon looked at him, obviously puzzled. The space where the giant toad had been was empty, and many of the smaller creatures had vanished too. Instead, there was a sickly reek of singed flesh, and a sort of oily yellow smoke.
‘I didn’t take that much,’ protested Noon. ‘No more than I’ve taken before, anyway.’
‘You must have surprised me.’ Tor looked back to the empty tomb. ‘So, no sword. Knocked into the mud by a giant toad. Drained by an over-enthusiastic fell-witch, and covered in mud a second time. Also, I think there is slime.’
‘What happened to the sword?’ asked Noon. Vintage had returned to the tomb and was peering over its edge.
‘Very likely it was never here, or someone got here first and pinched it.’ Vintage grimaced. ‘There’s a reasonably large crack in the bottom of this thing, so I suspect our prince’s body was just eaten over time by a variety of worm-touched frogs. That big toad probably crawled inside when it was a tiny baby thing, then grew to such an enormous size it couldn’t get out again. Toads can live for a very long time, you know.’
‘How utterly charming.’ Tor coughed. His lungs felt full of swamp stench. ‘You know, this feels like some sort of elaborate metaphor for Eboran history, or, indeed, my life.’ He held up his hands, as though picturing it. ‘A lot of misery and lies, ultimately revealed to contain nothing much save for a particularly ugly monster and a lingering smell.’
‘Tor . . .’
‘Come on, let’s get back to the war-beasts. I don’t want to spend another moment in this grim little armpit of Ebora.’
They walked back in an uncomfortable silence, although as they left the Wild-touched portion of the forest Tor felt his spirits lift a little. It was still summer in Ebora, and the forests of his birthplace were still beautiful – that had to mean something too. Perhaps enough to fill the void he’d felt inside since their experiences at Origin.
It was as they neared the clearing where the war-beasts rested that he began to feel the pain again. It flared at first in his chest, and then, oddly, in his arms, throbbing at his elbows and wrists. Annoyed, he pulled up his sleeve to massage his forearm and saw a livid red line, no more than an inch or so long, hidden in the hollow of his left elbow. He looked at it for a handful of seconds, feeling the last remnants of hope fall away into dust, and then he pulled the sleeve sharply down over it. To the others he said nothing.
Chapter Four
‘Please do be careful with that.’
Bern paused with the dagger tip pressing into the scarred flesh of his hand. He wore only his loose linen trousers, and he was sweating slightly all over, perched as he was on the edge of their bed. Aldasair took advantage of his stillness to move closer.
‘I can’t stand it any longer, Al.’ The big man spread his fingers so that the thick lump of crystal jutting from his palm caught the light. It glittered fetchingly, and Aldasair thought that in another time he might have thought it beautiful, yet instead it had become a symbol of hate and pain. ‘I have to cut it out. I could stand the pain of that, at least.’
‘It’s not the pain I’m worried about.’ Aldasair placed his hand over Bern’s wounded one, edging the blade away. ‘You know that we’ve spoken to Vintage about this more than once, and every time I come away convinced that you will only do yourself enormous harm. The delicate muscles and nerves in your hand could be damaged, you could lose all use of your hand. Please, Bern, think about this.’
‘Enormous harm.’ Bern shook his head. The big man looked uncommonly pale in the bright afternoon light, his blond hair dull and brassy against his broad forehead. His beard, normally so neatly trimmed, was getting wilder by the day, and his long braids were loose and uncared for. ‘I’ve already had an enormous harm done to me, Al. I can’t sleep, I can’t relax, because I can hear them all the time – whispering, scratching, ticking, all the time. I can’t eat, because everything tastes of ash. It’s got worse. It’s getting worse. Stones broken and cursed, what am I supposed to do?’
Aldasair pushed a
lock of blond hair back from the big man’s cheek. Bern’s connection to the Jure’lia was killing him; he didn’t need Lady Vintage to tell him that.
‘We’ll think of something,’ he said, not for the first time.
‘They’re broken and confused.’ Bern put the dagger down, and with a hand that was shaking slightly, he rubbed the sweat from his face. ‘And it’s infected me too.’
Aldasair opened his mouth to reply when there was a series of rapid knocks at the door. A face peeked around the edge; it was Norri, one of Bern’s Finneral guards.
‘Lords, we have some new arrivals. I think you should probably come and see them.’
Slowly, Bern got to his feet, picking up a shirt from the wooden trunk at the foot of their bed.
‘Norri, I told you not to call me that. I’m no lord.’
‘And I’m not really one either, truth be told,’ added Aldasair.
The woman rolled her eyes a touch. ‘Lord Aldasair, you are the closest thing Ebora has to a leader, and, technically, Bern is the son of a king, and, well . . .’ She gestured vaguely at the pair of them standing together. ‘It’s just easier to call you lords. My lords.’
Bern shrugged on his shirt and they followed Norri from their chambers. Out in the grounds of the palace quite a crowd had gathered, and it didn’t take long to see why; seven giant bats in full harness were sitting quite peaceably on the grass while the humans stood around admiring them. Some of the children were even being brave enough to stroke their furry flanks. One huge creature, a dusty grey in colour, bent his velvety head to be petted more efficiently.
‘More fell-witches,’ said Bern, uncharacteristically gruff.
‘It’s fine. We still have plenty of room.’
A group of women stood just near the bats, slightly apart from the crowd. Four of them wore green-and-grey travelling clothes, a uniform that Aldasair had learned to recognise as that of the Winnowry agents, while the other three wore a mixture of sturdy leather and linen, no doubt too warm for such a hot day, but necessary when flying over mountains. One of the agents spotted their approach and stepped forward. She was tall, and moved gracefully. As well as the rough bat-wing tattoo on her forehead that marked all fell-witches from the Winnowry, a beautiful tattoo of an eagle encircled her throat; picked out in vivid reds and browns and blues, it was, to Aldasair’s eye, a true work of art. Her hair was long and black, with a thick cord of white beginning just above her right temple.