by Jaine Fenn
Men sat or crouched against the tunnel’s slope and passed round waterskins and rations. Rhia examined the glow-globe more closely, turning it over in her hands. It was indeed a featureless globe of thick-blown glass. The glow was even throughout, although agitating the globe made it shine brighter.
“Best not do that too much, m’lady.”
“Why not?” Were the creatures within dangerous, liable to some explosive action if shaken?
“The glow is not permanent; after a while it fades. Making it brighter by shaking the globe means this happens sooner.”
“Ah. And we will need this for a few days yet, I imagine.”
“We will.”
“How many days, Captain?”
He hesitated, then said, “Three or four.”
“You cannot be sure?”
“I can only tell you what I have been told.” Slight irritation showed in his tone, but his next words were polite. “Shall I carry the glow-globe for a while, m’lady?”
“Yes, please do.” She had examined it as thoroughly as she could under the circumstances.
By the time they reached the next stop Rhia’s feet were dragging. She hoped they might be stopping to sleep – ideas of day and night mattered little down here, but she was ready to rest – but they carried on for one more stint before the final stop, men bedding down at all angles along the tunnel floor and sides. Rhia wanted to speak to Francin, but more than that, she needed rest.
When she woke, stiff and still tired, the day’s routine was repeated.
Rhia let Deviock carry the globe, but offered to take a turn holding it in the middle of the “day” to show she was not just a burden. Some time during the long dark trudge a lifetime of assuming others were there to serve her had come into question. He thanked her but said he was fine. She felt oddly offended, then chided herself.
To take her mind off the pain from her aching feet, and thoughts of what might await them and what was going on back in Shen, Rhia counted the tunnel’s features, such as they were. The vents and closed doors with their odd markings appeared regular, and she had an idea the doors’ markings were counting up, or possibly down. As the journey wore on she began to feel lightheaded, as though mildly intoxicated.
When they finally stopped to sleep, she ignored the urge to lie down, and picked her way through the soldiers towards Francin. She needed to know more of the duke’s plans.
Francin was easily identifiable amongst the shadowy figures up ahead because he was sitting on a camp stool. The privileges of rank had been reduced to this: the man in charge was the only one not sitting on the floor. His dog was curled up under the stool; beyond him Alharet was sitting with her children, not obviously guarded. Then again, there was nowhere to run to. She caught Rhia’s eye for a moment, her expression dull and cowed. Rhia tensed but the duchess showed no recognition, and looked away.
Francin smiled up at Rhia. She wanted to sit, even if it was on the floor, but if she did she would end up sleeping here and she wasn’t sure she wanted that; Francin’s presence was a comfort, but Alharet’s made her skin crawl. She contented herself with turning her back on the duchess, then crouching down with a half hiss, half groan at the pain of making her abused legs bend.
“You know, I expected more stars.”
She turned her attention from her bodily discomforts to her cousin. “Not down here, I assume.”
“No. But before we reached the umbral the clouds cleared and the stars came out. I thought that with the, ah, daytime shade gone, the night sky would also be brighter.”
“That’s not how it works.”
“So it’s not a single shade hovering above each shadowland, then?”
“I believe the shade-swarm is a great mass of structures, placed between our world and the Sun. They interact in complex ways, so the patches of shade they create remain constant even as the world turns. But when part of the world turns to face away from the Sun – when night falls – then it no longer faces the shade-swarm either.”
He sat up straighter. “So the loss of one shadowland… you said it was probably just Shen but surely if all the shade comes from the same place, every single shadowland could be affected!” His whisper had an edge of hysterical self-doubt she had never thought to hear from her self-assured cousin. She felt her own fears rise in response.
“I don’t know! As I said, this is an old and ingenious mechanism. It must be able to adjust, to compensate.” To think otherwise was to despair.
“Well then…” He let one of his dangling hands brush the tiny dog’s heaving flanks. “I will assume it could be worse, and be grateful.” He did not sound grateful so much as desolate.
“What will happen when we arrive in Zekt, Francin?” Assuming it was still there.
“One step at a time. First we must reach it.”
“And that will take, what, two more days?” Given the pace they were setting they must be under the mountains already.
“Aha, you’ve been pumping our militia captain for information.” He gave a wan smile. Behind her, Alharet was gently chiding her children, telling them to lie down and get some sleep; she sounded oddly unconcerned, as though this were some pleasure trip. “Two days if we’re lucky,” the duke continued. “But they will not be pleasant days.”
Rhia nodded. She had expected as much. None of the vents they passed in the second half of this day had emitted any breeze, which might explain the light-headedness. This sparked a new thought. “What is wrong with Alharet?” Though she faced away she kept her voice low; sound carried in odd ways in the tunnel.
“What do you mean?”
“She’s acting strangely. Even more strangely. Are you drugging her food, Francin?”
The duke grimaced and spread his hands. “Desperate times, Rhia.”
She hated him for this imposition. But she also saw his logic. And while they were talking about the duchess… “This plan of yours… does it relate to her brother?”
“That’s an uncharacteristically vague question for you, Rhia.”
“Don’t mess me about, Francin. Not here, not now.”
“All right: yes. The prince is a factor I have had to take into consideration.”
“Then you should probably know that she retains feelings for him.” Rhia shifted at a cramp in her shin.
“Feelings?”
“Francin, I think she’s still in love with her brother.”
“Ah yes, those feelings.”
“You know she feels that way?”
“Cousin, I don’t just know. I am relying on it.”
Rhia straightened, in part because her legs were about to give out but also because, yet again, the duke’s machinations had shocked her. “She’s your wife, Francin.”
“Technically, yes.”
Rhia’s taste for her cousin’s company fled. “I think I will leave you to your brooding.”
The next day she found herself getting breathless, though thinking this made the sensation worse so she wondered if she was imagining it. She thought she was getting hot too, which was odd as so far it had been pleasantly cool in the tunnel. Then one of blisters on her heel burst, and that took her mind off everything else for a while.
She kept counting the now-useless vents, and the doors, if only to distract herself from the pain and exhaustion. When she passed an open door she stopped mid-stride. Ignoring a mutter from Captain Deviock she hobbled up to the opening. Beyond, all was dark. She turned back to the militiaman and gestured for the light. He brought it over, looking less than pleased.
When he held it up she saw another great tube beyond the door, at least five times wider than theirs.
She stared at Deviock, who said, “We need to keep moving. You won’t find anything of interest in there; we’ve looked.”
She was too tired to argue. “All right, I’ll carry on, but only if you tell me what you found.”
They rejoined the column a fair way down. She was definitely out of breath now.
�
�I didn’t see it myself,” admitted Deviock when he’d caught his own breath, “but I understand there are two larger tunnels on either side of this one.”
“Why aren’t we using them? Surely we could move faster in a wider tunnel.”
“The air is worse in the big tunnels; no vents. Also, there are blockages, at the end and along the way.”
“What sort of blockages?”
“I don’t know.”
She let it lie. They were dealing with things beyond their experience. She could try asking Francin when they rested but she would have to get back past most of the column to reach him, and by the time they finally stopped all she wanted to do was sleep.
She awoke with a pounding headache. Someone was tightening an invisible band around her temples; another one encased her chest. Just breathing took willpower. Moving was a monumental effort. And everything seemed darker, the shadows sharper, though that might just be a trick of her increasingly clouded mind.
The men around her looked rough too, and it took an age to get going. But when they did, they kept up the pace. They had to, if they wanted to get out of here alive.
The march began to assume the quality of some relentless dark dream.
At the first stop she stood, swaying, because if she sat down she might never get up.
By the second rest stop she didn’t care. Her legs just folded. Someone caught her arm. She looked up into the face of a solider whose name she had once known. “M’lady, this is the final stretch. You must stay strong.”
It took her some time to work out what he meant, but when she did she locked her knees and hugged herself. She would stay upright, because if she fell over she would shatter into a thousand pieces.
During the third stint, reality kept tilting. More than once she stumbled into her companion. Sometimes he stumbled into her, and murmured an apology.
The column slowed. It must be time to rest. She indulged in a daydream of not having to move any more, of taking the weight off her raw feet. But they didn’t stop. She felt annoyed, cheated. Then her foot slipped. Her companion grabbed her, saving her from a fall. What had she stepped in? She bent over to look, holding his arm for support. The globe in the militiaman’s other hand barely glowed now. Even so she could see a thin runnel of something sticky, viscous and dark running along the bottom of the tunnel. Her breath caught.
“Countess!”
She waved a vague hand. “That’s blood.” Her voice barely broke a whisper.
“Please m’lady, if we stop now we’ll never make it. We’re nearly there.”
She let him haul her upright.
A little later they passed the source of the blood. A horse, lying on its side, its throat cut. Its eyes were open, staring up in exhausted desperation. Blood still trickled from the wound on its neck.
Nothing made sense any more. She’d known, once, why she was doing this. Now all she knew was that she had to keep walking, or she’d end up like that poor horse.
At first she thought she was hallucinating the faint breeze. Then she looked up and saw light ahead; very faint, grey on black. No wait: a sliver of silver, brighter by far than the near-spent glow-globe. Closer still and she knew that shape. Whitemoon. If she’d had the breath she would have laughed aloud.
CHAPTER 53
“I wish I could give you a parting-gift.”
The polished stones skykin pathfinders left with their offspring were meant to be special; iron stuck to them. Not that Dej had ever seen one. “But then, you’re at least as clanless as me, aren’t you?”
She’d made good time. Yesterday she’d spotted the characteristic dark patch of a shadowland off to the west – it had to be Zekt – and adjusted her course. Now, as evening approached, the towering clouds of its umbral filled her vision. She would need to circle it until she found a road. Crèches were built near roads, a short walk in from the umbral, to make them easy for pregnant skykin to find.
She was hungry all the time now. The two preserved rockslither segments had lasted a couple of days but since then she’d just grazed. Before, the odd stem or fruit was enough to keep her going; now her girl demanded more. But her girl was also coming soon, so she couldn’t afford the time for serious foraging.
Although the road would be farther south, she’d reach the shadowland’s umbral tonight. Maybe she’d go all the way in, see if she could get hold of some shadowkin food. That was odd: the thought of committing theft no longer gave her the guilty flush of pleasure it once had. Must be Jat’s influence.
What if she just stayed in the umbral? People didn’t live there, and her daughter would be safe from the killing Sun under the trees. But that assumed she could birth her unaided, and then she’d need feeding with shadowkin milk; Dej could hardly steal from the very breast of a nursing mother, even if she could find one.
“I’ll have to give you up to save you, won’t I?” The thought hurt, but this must be how it felt to all skykin mothers, clanless or not: the drive to keep their child safe overcame the pain at losing the baby. It had to be that way. She knew that now.
Still, she’d camp in the umbral tonight, for the safety and shelter it offered. Assuming she reached it today. Used to the wide vistas of the open skyland she’d misjudged the distance. It was dusk already and she was still some way off.
She stopped between one step and the next, as her mind registered something unexpected.
The land was lush here, with moss-grass covered ground and bush things in abundance. But that bush looked wrong. It was… square. All shapes, sizes and colours were possible in the skyland, but like the ancient house on the plateau this was a manmade thing.
She changed course and walked up to the object. A square wooden box, high as her waist. Not ironwood, but sturdy enough to keep most skyland creatures out. As she got nearer she caught a familiar scent. She walked round it once; fine detail was lost in the growing darkness, but it reminded her of the storage bins back at the crèche. And like them, it contained food. She could smell it. She lifted the lid. Dark shapes inside resolved in the twilight. A large canvas bundle – a tent – a pair of empty backpacks, a coil of rope, some staves and a half full sack. The smell came from the sack. This close to this much food she could focus on nothing else. She leaned in to lift the sack out. She even placed the smell now, rice cakes and dried fruit–
“Ahem.”
Dej straightened, dropping the sack. Her other hand still held the lid and now she slammed it down, revealing a skykin standing a few paces away on the far side of the box.
She knew him. Even in the dark that presence was familiar. “Cal?”
“The very same.”
Something was wrong with his eye. “I thought you died with the others in the mudslide.” She’d hoped so.
“Apparently not. No thanks to you. Or your lover.” His damaged gaze travelled down to her swollen belly.
“What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same.” His glance went up, past her.
“Although the answer’s obvious really.” She had a sensation of another presence, approaching fast from behind.
Even as she began to turn something dropped over her head, and a moment later a hand grabbed her wrist to stop her reaching for her sword.
Cal said, “You’re stealing from us. Again.”
Someone kicked her legs out from under her.
CHAPTER 54
“Water m’lady?”
“What? Yes please.” She didn’t remember getting to the umbral, or falling asleep. She had a vague memory of scrambling towards moonlight; the exit from the tunnel was just a hole in the ground. Of course: Captain Sorne would have had to excavate it alone. And now she was lying in the shade of Zekt’s umbral, a bright skyland day off to one side. She sat up and drained the near-empty waterskin, then allowed the militiaman to help her stand. “Where’s the duke?”
“He headed over to the far side of the umbral.”
“Take me to him please.”
D
eeper in, and the skyland silver faded. They left behind the scatter of men sitting up against trees or lying on the ground, looking as exhausted as she felt. Faint light showed ahead. Golden, shadowland light. Rhia released the breath she’d been holding.
The duke was talking to Lord Prendor and General Crethen, looking out from the edge of Zekt’s umbral forest into lush farmland and pointing at something. He turned at her approach and smiled. “Ah, our non-native guide.”
“What?”
His companions did not look pleased to see her. Francin continued, “We were discussing how to re-provision the men.”
“Re-provision?”
“Cousin, you are clearly still dazed from our recent ordeal.”
He was right: some time during the endless march through the tunnel a mental shroud had dropped over her, an invisible barrier shielding body and mind from unbearable reality. But she could not afford to hide, to give up. She shook her head, trying to clear it. “You’re planning to stay here then?”
“The bulk of the men will. Also the remaining horses; I fear it will be some days before they are of use again. I was actually wondering what the chances were of purchasing supplies from a local noble.”
“I think things are more expensive here.”
“Not a problem.”
Of course not. Think past the shroud. “Obviously you’ll have thought of this too, but once you reveal yourself to the locals, someone will send word to Mirror-of-the-Sky.”
“Which is one reason we will be leaving for the city this morning.”
“When you say ‘we’…”
“Just myself, a few guards, the duchess and you. Lord Crethen would have accompanied us, but he fell in the tunnel and injured his ankle.” Now she looked, Rhia noticed Francin’s advisor leaning on a stick. “We need to move quickly and arrive as negotiators, not invaders. I was about to send someone for you. You have knowledge of Zekt and, unlike my wife, I know you will share all you know.”
“Yes, how does Alharet feel about this?”
“She accepts the situation.” His tone implied that was an end to it. “Rhia, do you have your sightglass?”