by Ian Irvine
Tali had seen it before, once at Lyf’s caverns under Precipitous Crag, and another time when Rix, partly under Grandys’ thrall, had attempted to raise his opalised body from the place where Lyf’s wry-then had cast it in ancient times. Neither Abysm, it had since emerged, was the real one—they were merely displaced echoes of the true Abysm which had always been concealed here.
Everyone assembled around the shaft, to bear witness. Lyf’s ancestor gallery was there too, one hundred and six spirit kings and queens. Moley Gryle stood by the canister containing king-magery.
Tali stood apart from everyone else, looking down, because every Cythonian eye was on her and she did not like being the focus of attention. She had spent too much time as a slave trying to avoid attention.
What did they make of her decision? Her life story, her incredible escape from Cython, her bouts with Lyf, and the tale of the rebellion she had led in Cython, were known to them all. Did they accept her decision to be the sacrificial soul, or did they, like Rannilt, think she planned to avenge herself on Lyf at the last moment? Whatever they thought, it did not show in their black eyes.
Her friends were also watching her. Tali could feel the pressure of their combined gazes. She kept looking down the Abysm. It seemed easier, somehow. She had once seen multi-coloured loops and whorls in its walls, patterns that held vast power. She had even tapped a tiny amount of it, months ago, but with the master pearl gone she could neither see the patterns nor draw upon the power. When she looked down the Abysm now, she saw only black.
Had Tobry appealed to her to live, she might have repudiated her offer to Lyf. Tobry’s agony was evident on his face. He had begged her to stay until his end, and she had not even been able to do that for him.
But whatever Tobry was thinking, he stayed mute.
Lyf and Errek walked among the Cythonians, those who had been brought here from Caulderon because they were the best, strongest, cleverest or wisest. From these they selected fifteen possible candidates for the new king.
“Doesn’t the old king select the new one?” said Rix.
“The choice is too important to be left to one man, no matter his rank,” said Lyf.
Errek smiled at that. “King-magery itself selects the new king—the one judged most suited to the task.”
“When? Now?”
“Once king-magery has been released, after Lyf passes the Lower Gate.”
“And it selects the new king from those fifteen?” said Rix.
“Often, but not always. Sometimes it selects another. And occasionally it selects none.”
“What happens then?” said Benn, who was studying the proceedings, wide-eyed. The end of the war had released him from his burdens and he was happily being a boy again.
“More of our people must be brought to the Abysm,” said Errek, “and sometimes even a third lot, until king-magery touches one and its work is done.”
He raised his hands. The low hum of talk died away. Wind sighed through the overgrown ruins. Tali expected an oration, or perhaps a eulogy, but Lyf had asked that there be none.
“It is time,” Errek said simply. “All hail the king.”
The Cythonians cheered, as did the Hightspallers, and Tali too. This was no time to be churlish. The ovation echoed up and down the shaft, then died away.
Lyf accepted the potion from his weeping adjutant. Moley Gryle had prepared it lovingly, according to the ancient formula. He raised it to his people, to his ancestor gallery and then to his former enemies. All saluted him. He drained the cup, lay back, closed his eyes, and in a minute he was dead.
His ancestor gallery faded with his death, save only Errek First-King, who as a wrythen had an independent existence. He reached out to the body, intoned the rites of shriving he had written in the impossibly distant past, then raised his hand.
“Come.”
Lyf’s body drifted across until it was floating above the Abysm. Lyf’s wrythen separated from it and waited there until Errek joined him. He reached out to Tali.
“Do you still cleave to your offer to be Lyf’s sacrificial soul?”
Tali dared not look at her friends’ faces. It would have undermined her resolve.
“I—I do,” she said.
“Then come.”
She found herself lifted up and drifting across the Abysm. When she joined Lyf and Errek, they began to sink. Now, as she looked on her friends’ faces for the last time, she saw the pain she was causing them, even Rannilt. Too late!
Lyf, Errek and Tali sank down the Abysm. Tobry cried out in anguish. Tali could not bear to look up.
“I thought I would escape the pain in death,” said Lyf after a minute or two, “yet still my shins throb from Grandys’ cruel blow two thousand years ago.”
“Soon you will be free of all pain,” said Errek.
Down they went, and ever down, until the Abysm was black above and below, and its top became a tiny circle of white no bigger than a dot. Tali had no idea how far they had gone. It could have been miles. She could see the relief on Lyf’s face as his pain was progressively lifted from him. Her pain, however, physical and mental, grew ever worse.
“The Lower Gate,” said Errek.
Tali saw no gate, merely a point where the Abysm changed from uniform black to pure, dazzling white. Her pain was almost unbearable, and it would be much worse when she passed, alive, through the Lower Gate. What happened after that she did not know, save that she would die. She hoped it was quick.
Lyf’s body passed through the Lower Gate and disappeared. His wrythen stopped above it. “It’s gone!” he cried in wonderment. “All pain is gone.”
He looked young and whole again, as he must have before his murder. Even his feet were restored.
“Come,” said Errek. “We have both endured far beyond our allotted span, and I long for surcease.”
“There is one final task,” said Lyf.
“You astound me.” Errek was smiling.
“I did Tali, her family and the women of her line a great wrong.”
“Yes, you did,” said Errek.
“Before I pass through the Lower Gate I have to atone. At least, I must do all I can to atone.”
“That would be the action of a true king.”
“But what I propose to do has never been done before. And I don’t think I can do it alone.”
“I doubt that you can,” Errek said blandly.
“But with your help—”
“It will strain you to your limits. And if you take her pain upon yourself, it will not be lifted when you pass through the Lower Gate.”
“I know,” said Lyf, “but that’s the price I must pay.”
“What—what are you talking about?” said Tali. “Whatever it is, don’t I get a say?”
“No,” said Errek.
“Why not?”
“There’s no democracy after death.”
And precious little before it, she thought.
Lyf and Errek reached out and touched her, Lyf on the right shoulder, Errek on the brow. They strained for a few seconds, then all pain lifted from her. It came as such a relief that she floated up a few feet.
“There will be a cost to you, too,” said Errek. “Before Lyf could take your pain upon himself, he had to give you a little of himself.”
“What cost?” said Tali.
“You may outlive all your friends and everyone you know.”
“Since I’ll be down here, and they’re in the real world, I hardly see that it matters.”
“Ah,” said Errek. “There’s something Lyf neglected to tell you.”
“What’s that?”
“In ten thousand years of king-magery it has never been done before.”
“Yes?” said Tali, still not understanding.
“We’re sending you back.”
She drifted for a few seconds. “Back?” she croaked.
Lyf nodded.
Tears formed in her eyes and she did not wipe them away. “Thank you.”
“There may
come a time,” said Errek, “when you will long for release as much as I do. If that time comes you, alone among your kind, may take our Abysm.”
“Thank you,” she repeated, bowing to each of them.
“There is no nobler act than being a king’s sacrificial soul,” said Lyf.
He gestured and Tali began to drift upwards.
“I too have one final task,” said Errek. “To pass on king-magery.”
“But…” said Lyf. “Who are you passing it to?”
Errek smiled enigmatically but did not reply. He raised his right hand and pointed past Tali, up the shaft.
They drifted through the Lower Gate and vanished into white. Tali gave a great sigh.
Surely, now, the best justice that could be done had been done.
CHAPTER 94
“Had enough,” muttered Rannilt. “Want to go home.’
Rix did too. They had been standing at the edge of the Abysm for hours, waiting for the sign that king-magery had anointed the new king, but no sign had yet come. He was cold, tired, wet and hungry, and he just wanted to go back to Garramide, close the door to his chambers and be alone with his grief.
“We can’t,” he said as patiently as he could. “It would be a great insult to the Cythonian people to walk away at such an important time.”
“Bugger the Cythonian people!” Rannilt muttered.
“Rannilt!” hissed Glynnie. “Where did you learn such language?”
“We’ve just ended a war that began two thousand years ago,” Rix said to Rannilt. “Insulting the Cythonians would not be a good way to begin the peace.”
Rannilt scowled across the Abysm. They were laughing, joking, and loudly debating which of the candidates would be the next king. Whoever it was, he would inherit a devastated land, and his choices would either heal it or destroy it.
An argument broke out between two rival candidates, each loudly stating his own qualities and decrying the qualities of his rival.
Moley Gryle came running across, her black hair flying. “How dare you!” she cried, pushing them apart. “It will certainly be neither of you.”
The rivals grinned, shook hands and walked off cheerfully. Rannilt made that seething sound again and went to Tobry, who was standing by himself, staring down into the Abysm with a desolate look on his face.
“It’s all right,” she said gently. “You’ve still got us.”
He clutched at her hand and dragged his other hand across his eyes.
Rix swallowed the lump in his throat and went looking for Glynnie. Before he reached her there came a dazzling explosion of golden light from the canister of king-magery, a fountain that rose up from the centre and rained light beams down over all.
The core of the fountain continued rising. It drifted around over the heads of the Cythonians, then the fifteen candidates, and on, then finally swooped and settled.
On Rannilt.
Who was staring around her as if she had no idea what was going on.
There was utter silence for twenty seconds, then a deafening clamour as everyone, Cythonians and Hightspallers, started talking at once.
“Who the hell is she?” said an unidentified voice from the throng.
“Why her?” said one of the young men who had been fighting several minutes ago. “She’s not even one of us.”
“She’s just a grubby little kid,” said the second young man. “It’s got to be a mistake.”
Moley Gryle stepped forward. She held a parchment envelope in one hand.
“King-magery has spoken. The girl named Rannilt has been gifted with king-magery. She is our child-queen.”
“But she’s a girl!” said a third candidate.
“Queens generally come from girls,” Moley Gryle said with evident sarcasm.
“But… she’s not one of us. She’s a Pale.”
Moley Gryle held up the envelope. “This was given to me by Errek First-King, before he passed down the Abysm.” She unsealed it and began to read.
“Rannilt’s mother was a Pale,” she read, “and her father was Cythonian. She is the best choice to unite our two peoples in the troubled times that lie ahead. But Rannilt has been chosen for other, finer qualities. She is the only gifted person never to use her great gift for herself, but only to help others.
“And because, when Lyf stole quessence from this innocent child five months ago, she lost her magical gift but gained Lyf’s healing gift to enhance her own. No one but a future sovereign could have gained, and so wisely used, the healing gift of a king of Cythe.”
Again there was silence. The radiance was slowly dwindling above Rannilt, shrinking as if it was passing into her. She kept turning around and around. She had no idea what to say, nor what to do.
Tobry stepped forward and put his arm around her.
“Rannilt!” he said thickly. “Queen of Cython; Queen of Hightspall.”
“The land’s gunna need a new name,” said Rannilt. “Not Cythe or Cython, nor Hightspall neither.” She looked up at the glow above her. “I’m gunna call the land Radian.”
Rix smiled. It was a good start.
The Cythonians flooded around her. Rannilt clung to Tobry for a moment, before stepping forward, spraying her own golden radiance from her fingertips, to accept the congratulations of her people. And despite her ragged clothing, which was no cleaner than it should have been, in the golden light she did look like a little queen.
Rix pushed his way through the throng to Moley Gryle and shook her hand.
“Will your people challenge her?” he said anxiously.
“Oh, no,” said Moley Gryle. “The choice made by king-magery can’t be challenged. It’s the only way a new king—or queen—can be appointed.”
“What will your people do now? Caulderon must surely be uninhabitable—and much of Central Hightspall.”
“Our numbers here are only a few hundred, but we’ll clean out Turgur Thross and make it habitable again, then send out search parties to find out where the rest of our people—the survivors—have taken refuge. I think some may have gone back to Cython, begging for sanctuary, though whether they gained it…”
“Miracles have happened lately,” said Rix.
“Yes, they have. But until we know what’s happened to them, and can plan for the troubling future, it might be best if Rannilt remained with her own people. She has much to get used to.”
Rix offered Moley Gryle whatever help in men and supplies he could spare, including the vast quantities of goods, wagons and food Grandys’ fleeing army had abandoned outside Garramide. She thanked him, gravely, and turned away to her people.
Then she turned back, surreptitiously withdrew a small, heavy parcel from inside her coat and handed it to him.
“She’ll need this,” Moley Gryle said quietly. “Best if it’s always kept secret.”
Rix put it in an inner pocket. She picked up the empty canister and turned away.
“Let’s go,” said Rannilt. “I’m starvin’.”
As they were heading to the horses, and the Cythonians prepared to close off the Abysm again, Tobry stopped dead, making a whimpering sound in his throat. Light was flooding up. He stumbled to the edge, his arms outstretched, as Tali rose out of the top of the Abysm and settled on the ashy, trampled grass.
She opened her eyes, looked around, and he was the first person she saw. She went to him. Knelt before him. Bowed her head.
“I’m sorry for being such a fool,” she said, her voice muffled. “Can—can you ever forgive me?”
He looked down at the top of her head, which was covered in golden stubble. The bandage was gone, and so was the wound, save for a small round scar.
“We’ll see,” said Tobry gruffly.
“I don’t deserve you.”
“No, you don’t.”
He lifted her to her feet and they walked off, together but separate.
CHAPTER 95
No one said a word in the time it took to ride back to Garramide. Even Rannilt was unacc
ountably silent.
Tali was free of the pain in her head, the hot and cold flushes from her fever, and the nausea in her belly. Lyf had lifted all that from her when he had taken her pain on himself. But she was still tired, still weak and still worried about Tobry. She had no idea how he felt about her, or if he could ever forgive her, though she felt sure he still wanted to die.
His own pain had not been lifted, nor the shifter curse.
After a late lunch they assembled upstairs, in an octagonal room below the old dame’s observatory. It had been one of Tobry’s favourite places and Rannilt had adopted it on their return, refusing to let him reoccupy the grim Black Hole far below.
Tali looked out the west-facing window. Volcanic dust had reduced the sun’s light to a feeble glow and it was almost as chilly as the endless winter that had only recently ended. Was it coming back—a volcanic winter?
“The harvest will be poor this year,” said Rix, as if to break the silence, “and perhaps for years to come. Life will be hard. And the ice closes in faster than ever.”
“I thought,” said Glynnie, “if the land was healed, the ice might be turned back.”
“Queen-magery won’t be easy to learn, much less to master, and nor will it be quick. The kings of old Cythe were trained from birth, but who will train Rannilt? Magery has always been forbidden among the Cythonians, and with Lyf and Errek gone, who can teach her?”
Rannilt looked up from a pamphlet on magery she was studying, then down again.
“Not many on our side, either,” said Tali. “Lyf targeted our magians as soon as the war began. Most of them are dead and I dare say the rest have gone into hiding. They won’t be easy to coax out.”
“But we did it!” cried Glynnie. She stood up. “When I look around the room, all I see is long faces. What’s the matter with you? We did it! We fought for our land and our people. We fought against overwhelming odds—and we won!”
No one spoke, though one or two people were smiling.
“Yes, the future looks gloomy,” Glynnie went on. “Yes, we’re probably going to be hungry, and cold, and afraid a lot of the time over the next few years. But that’s for tomorrow to worry about. For tonight, let’s celebrate that we’re alive, that we beat Grandys, that we have food in our bellies and a safe place to sleep. And that the war is over!”