Serpent's Child (The Mindbender's Rise Book 3)

by D J Salisbury

  “I hear you, kid.” Lorel tightened the stallion’s girth.

  Tsai’dona hurried to her mare to do the same.

  They both mounted and urged the horses into a gallop.

  Viper sighed. He stared north for several seconds before encouraging the team to walk a little faster.

  They ignored him, as usual.

  ***

  Early the next afternoon, they camped near the center of the graveyard. Viper chose a site on the inland side of the boneyard, far enough from the ocean that they need not worry about the fierce tides, but near enough to hunt for seaweed and fish.

  The wind was cold enough to freeze lava. When would spring arrive this far north? No, it couldn’t arrive until they’d finished the Kyridon’s weapons. Thunderer, he had so much to do before spring.

  He freed the team to graze on beach grass. The girls unbridled but didn’t unsaddle their horses. He suspected he would soon be abandoned. Again. Probably right after lunch.

  Together they set up camp, but both girls were distracted and restless.

  As soon as she’d finished devouring her portion of seaweed-flavored rice, Lorel eased the bridle over her horse’s head, tightened his girth, and swung up onto Nightshade’s saddle. “We gotta scout the area.”

  Tsai’dona finished scrubbing the rice pot with sand before she hustled off to her own little mare. “And look for food, too.”

  Were they crazy? Not to mention they hardly ever brought in anything edible. “What is there to see besides a lot of big bones?”

  “It don’t matter. We gotta know what’s around us. We’ll go inland.”

  There was nothing inland but sheer cliffs and snow-covered mountains. He couldn’t even see a break in the cliffs that might indicate a pass.

  No, his turybirds were simply bored.

  He shrugged and pulled his cloak tighter around his shoulders. “In that case, I’ll check the beach.”

  Lorel rode off in a flurry of sand, with Tsai’dona close behind her.

  Sand sprayed all over him.

  “Bahtdor bait!” They could’ve let him get out of sand-throwing range. He brushed grit off his cloak and out of his hair.

  After checking on the team one last time, he limped toward the ocean.

  It felt like walking through a temple of filigree silver. The haphazard beauty of the gigantic skeletons made the Paduan temple of human bone seem frail and tame.

  The voices of dead Hreshith sang all around him, and he wanted to sing with them. If only he knew the tune. Or could sing in tune.

  There was power here. Power much like the trapped power in the temple, but wild and free. And calm. Much calmer. Not older, but more distant. It felt like the ocean, slow and subtle, where that other power felt like the wind, direct and dynamic.

  Caches of driftwood lay in hollows around the skeletons. They’d have no trouble gathering wood to cook with, no matter how long they stayed here.

  When he finally reached the shoreline, Viper peered north along the coast with mock diligence, then looked to the south. “Sand and water, as always.”

  A huge chunk of ice floated in that water, drifting southward. Why hadn’t it melted? Was the ocean really that cold? He huddled deeper into his cloak. The wind was cold enough. Just thinking of all that cold water made him shudder. How had he survived the icy bath the Kyridon had ordered him to take when his shoulder was injured?

  He gathered a thick handful of seaweed fronds and headed back to camp, swinging wide to the north instead of following his tracks.

  A brook trickled through the sand less than half a mile from the wagon. Succulent glasswort grew along the edge. The thought of a real salad made his mouth water. He gathered a few leaves and munched on them as he limped back to camp.

  There might be frogs and clams upstream somewhere. What would the girls say to frog soup? If they wanted it, they’d have to catch the frogs all by themselves. No way was he going into that cold water. Maybe it was too cold this far north for frogs. He’d look that up. He had a decent book on amphibia… No, that was back at home, in Trevor’s library, not here.

  He found the girls just outside their camp. Tsai’dona sat near the fire, carving on what looked like a stick of fresh pine. Lorel held a large chunk of bone in her hands and glared at it fiercely.

  “I found fresh water north of here.” Viper took a pot out of the middle trunk and laid the seaweed inside. The cold air would keep it fresh until dinner. “We should move the wagon there before dark.”

  Lorel continued to glare at the bone in her hands.

  “What are you doing, turybird?”

  “I gotta find the right bone to make that musical weapon.” She tossed the bone aside and rummaged through the piles surrounding the camp.

  Tsai’dona looked up from her carving. “I don’t see how you can choose which bones to use when you don’t know what you’re going to carve.”

  “So what?” Lorel continued to hunt through the Hreshith skeleton, eyeing and discarding the silver bones.

  Several minutes passed quietly. The only sounds were the roar of the ocean, the wind through the forest of skeletons, and the thud of discarded bone on sand.

  He picked through the bones Lorel had thrown away. She had a point about getting started. They were running out of time. The spring equinox was less than a lunar away, and they had four weapons to finish.

  Lorel slammed her fist into a thin, flat bone still connected to the skeleton. The bone didn’t move a fingerwidth. She stepped back, shaking her hand. “Besides, the kid don’t know what kind of swords to carve, either, but he’s looking, too.”

  Viper sighted down the eight-foot bone he’d been examining. It seemed straight enough, but maybe not long enough. “I do know. I dreamed about them last night. Of a sword, short and curved, to light a way for fire, and of a long sword, great and wide, to open a path for earth.” Or for air. The dream had gotten confusing at the end.

  Lorel snorted. “Your usual crummy poetry. What’s it mean?”

  “The first is the type of sword the northern Setoyans favor.” He sketched a curve in the sand with the heel of his padded boot. “Trevor called it a scimitar. The other is a great sword, a broadsword.”

  She nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, that fits. You know how to make both them kinds of swords?”

  “Of course I do.” Well, more or less he did. “Now you need to think about what type of musical instruments to make.”

  “You got fire and earth, so I get wind and water.” Lorel kicked at the sand. “How about I make a seahorn, ’cuz it sounds like the ocean? Or a flute, ’cuz it sounds like the wind.”

  “The swordling’s selections are advantageous,” the Kyridon said from atop the wagon. What was it doing up there? It rarely braved the cold wind, even in its serdil-pelt coat.

  Lorel glared at the creature. “I ain’t figured out which one to make, toad.”

  “The swordling disregards that two Weapons of magic must be fashioned. The swordling has chosen admirably.”

  Her mouth worked. “Two? Fraying two instruments?” She turned to Viper. “Do I really gotta make both?”

  Hadn’t she been listening? The Kyridon had been telling her that for lunars. Maybe she was going deaf in her old age. “I’m afraid so, elder sister.”

  “Hey, what’s this ‘elder sister’ crap?”

  He dipped his head and peeked at her through his lashes. “You say I’m your brother, and you’re definitely older than I am, so – Elder Sister.”

  Tsai’dona giggled.

  “Weaver stuff you into a chamberpot.” Her fists clenched, but a grin played around Lorel’s lips. “You knock that off or I’ll knock you off.”

  He was pretty sure she wouldn’t actually hit him again. Mostly sure. “Anything you say, elder sister.”

  Lorel howled and leapt after him.

  He laughed and dashed behind the wagon. He rolled underneath and limped away on the other side before she figured out where he’d gone. “I’ll ra
ce you. The first one back with an armload of firewood wins.”

  Tsai’dona dropped her carving because she was laughing too hard to hold onto it.

  “Done!” Lorel spat into the sand, and sprinted toward the ocean.

  He hobbled toward the stash he’d noted, not a hundred yards away.

  ***

  Viper lazily watched the burning driftwood. The colors burned bright that night, and the fish on the grill sizzled temptingly. The rice cakes were golden brown and almost smelled like real bakery bread.

  Tsai’dona edged closer to the colorful flames, mending something, as usual. He guessed she wanted more light, but he was too relaxed to create a will-light unless she asked for one. And unlike Lorel, she never had.

  Nightshade bugled, and Poppy nickered back. Periwinkle and Sumach grazed quietly just at the edge of the firelight.

  He heard Lorel stomping out by the horses, so he called to her. “Are you ready for dinner, elder sister?”

  Chapter 18.

  They settled into a routine over the next several days. Tsai’dona scoured the beach for seaweed and stranded fish. Lorel cleaned the catch and eventually got good at it. He cooked, Tsai’dona washed the dishes and pots.

  Lorel and he spent the rest of daylight carving weapons out of Hreshith bone. All of his dust and shavings he saved in carefully-sealed jars. If he’d thought ahead, he wouldn’t have bought the Crayl steel weapons. Sorcerers paid outrages prices for Hreshith dust, and it was a lot easier to transport than steel. But his turybird would never understand that sort of economics. Both girls still polished all the Crayl weapons each morning.

  Only seventeen days were left until the spring equinox. And the magical weapons were barely started. It was too early to panic. He hoped.

  Right now, as usual this time of the morning, Tsai’dona was out foraging. Viper wished she were here. The girl somehow kept Lorel from driving him turybird insane. Or at least, she slowed down the process.

  He carved another slice off the long, silvery bone that would eventually become the broadsword. The curled sliver fell on his lap, on top of his fur cloak. His chilled fingers felt ready to cramp, but he wanted to finish this section. Praise the Thunderer for the lava lizard’s warming skull. He’d be frozen solid without it. How did the girls manage in this cold?

  Lorel tossed her huge, partially-carved bone into the sand. “I give up.” Icy steam wreathed her face, emphasizing her words. And her despair.

  He blinked at her to refocus his concentration. “Don’t give up on it yet. You’ve been working too hard, that’s all. What’s wrong with it? And, forgive me, what are you making?” He really should know. He was supposed to be in charge of this project.

  “The seahorn.” Lorel leaned back and brushed hair out of her eyes. “Most times a seahorn is eighteen feet of brass tubing with a bell on the end and all bent round and round until it ain’t no bigger than this.” She held her hands in front of her, the width of her muscular shoulders separating her palms.

  “So?”

  “I’m trying to carve it as though it were already bent up like that, and to carve it half and half outta two solid pieces of bone. I been working on it for days and days, and I ain’t gotten nowhere.” She held up the thick, wide bone. She’d carved channels into it, so that it looked like an ogre’s attempt at latticework. “What was this thing, anyways?”

  “Maybe a shoulder blade.” Viper shrugged. “If fish have shoulders.”

  “Whatever.” She hurled the silver bone far away from camp. “It don’t matter, ’cuz it ain’t gonna work.”

  “You’re trying too hard.” He leaned back against the wagon wheel and stretched. “You know, I’ve had a craving lately.”

  “How’d you manage to get knocked up?” Lorel sneered like a villain in a melodrama. “You been messing around with Nightshade?”

  He rolled his eyes. He would not reply to her juvenile teasing. This time, anyway. Or not until Tsai’dona got back to protect him. “I’ve been dreaming of fried eggs. Lots and lots of eggs, fried up brown and crispy.”

  “Oh, yeah.” She swallowed hard. “You’re making my mouth water.”

  “I still have half a cask of lard.” His own belly was rumbling now. “And there are a whole lot of gulls nesting up on White Rock.”

  “Yeah? So what?”

  “Do you know what birds do when they start nesting?” He drew an oval in the sand with the hilt of his carving knife. “They lay eggs.”

  “Eggs!” She dropped her tools in the sand, leapt to her feet, rushed to the back of the wagon, and grabbed a bridle. “Nightshade, get over here! We’re going egg hunting.” She slid the bit into the stallion’s mouth.

  She snagged a basket and hopped up on the horse’s bare back. Without a backward glance, they galloped away.

  He crawled over to the aborted carving. “She’s right. This will never work. She’ll have to think of something else to make. Some other instrument.”

  “The seahorn is critical to the outcome of the endeavor.” Blast, a witness to his bribery. The Kyridon must have heard them talking. Any mention of the weapons always brought it out to supervise.

  He looked up at the driver’s platform. “Do you know of another way to make one?”

  “There is another method. The hatchling must discover said method. The swordling cannot do so. Such innovation is not in the swordling’s nature.” The Kyridon curled up tighter and laid its head down.

  He couldn’t tell if the serpent’s eyes were open because of the serdil coat covering its head. There was no point in pestering it with questions he knew it wouldn’t answer, anyway. He dropped the aborted weapon and limped back to collect Lorel’s abandoned, painfully expensive, and irreplaceable carving knives.

  Why was he the brains of this outfit? Maybe because he couldn’t be the brawn. The Kyridon knew what needed to be done, but it wouldn’t tell.

  It never told him the important stuff. He always had to figure it out for himself.

  Maybe that was the point.

  He’d tell Lorel to carve the flute while he worked on the problem. There had to be a way. A sagacious method, as the Kyridon would say. He’d find her a way to make a seahorn, no matter what it took.

  Just when he’d gotten the broadsword’s shape roughed out, the girls strolled into camp, their horses trailing after them.

  Blast, one of the horses must be injured. He hadn’t seen those two on foot in ages. “What’s wrong?”

  Moving gingerly, Lorel set the basket beside his foot. “We kinda nabbed too many.”

  Wind Dancer forgive them. They may have wiped out the whole next generation of seabirds. The basket was so full the sides bulged. “I guess we’ll have quite a feast.” He only hoped gull eggs tasted better than gull adults did.

  Tsai’dona snickered at him like she knew what he was thinking.

  But Lorel was sulking. Her pouty lip drooped halfway to Zedista. Why wasn’t she excited? She’d been craving something besides rice for a lunar.

  “What’s wrong, turybird?”

  She turned away from him.

  He rolled his eyes. “Tsai’dona, please bring out both skillets, the cask of lard, and the salt jar.” He’d finally realized that he got better results when he told the turybirds exactly what he wanted, and not leave anything to their discretion. It had taken him long enough to notice that it was embarrassing.

  When Tsai’dona tiptoed over the Kyridon and vanished inside the wagon, he turned back to Lorel. “Tell me. Now. What’s wrong?”

  “I spent my whole life learning how to be a warrior.” She paced away from camp, grabbed a tree-sized chunk of driftwood, and dragged it closer to use as a chair. “I fought. I chased the gangs. I killed people.”

  He knew she’d killed slavers. She’d killed Kraken. He had to remember that when he was furious with her. She’d killed that sadist Kraken. To avenge what the monster had done to him.

  She jumped up and dragged another oversized piece of driftwood closer to th
e wagon. Too bad it was too big to burn. “You know why I did all that?” She slumped down onto the improvised chair.

  Yes, he knew. “Tell me.”

  “Because I hate making musical instruments!”

  The scream frightened all four horses into galloping away from camp.

  Metal clanged and clattered like a battle was being fought directly behind them.

  They both jumped to their feet.

  The Kyridon lifted its head off the driver’s bench.

  Tsai’dona’s face turned bright red. “Sorry, I dropped the skillets.” She slid from the driver’s platform to the ground and gathered them up. “You startled me.”

  At least she hadn’t dropped his salt or the lard. He could probably figure out how to get salt out of the ocean, but nothing had fat on it this time of year. Cooking without grease would ruin his reputation as a chef.

  Lorel sank back onto her driftwood chair and covered her face with her hands. “I made my family hate me because I hated their trade.”

  “They don’t hate you.” He’d never met them, but he was certain of that just from the stories she told him.

  “My brothers do.”

  He snorted. “They’d be mad at you no matter what you did for a living. You teased them too much.”

  She made a little noise that sounded suspiciously like a sob. Or a laugh. Maybe halfway between, except Lorel was never halfway anything.

  “It’s worse than that.” She sniffed, sat up, and wiped her sleeve across her nose. “I hate making them, and now I can’t even do it right.”

  “If I knew anything about it, I’d help you,” Tsai’dona whispered.

  Viper stood and limped over to stand beside her. “You simply don’t have the tools to make a seahorn. Work on the flute, and let me think about the problem.” He thumped her shoulder. “I know you’ve made flutes.”

  “Hundreds of them. Well, dozens. They’re easy.” She kicked at the sand. “Maybe too easy for what the toad needs.”

  “Simple may be exactly what’s needed.” But now he’d worry if she was right. Easy and magic rarely went together.