The Night of the Swarm tcv-4

by Robert V. S. Redick

  ‘I’ve been lost for an hour,’ he said. ‘There are three or four ways to get everywhere in this land, and twice as many to get nowhere you’ve seen before. Aren’t we running late?’

  ‘Not at all,’ said Ramachni. ‘The temple is quite near. Save your strength for tomorrow and walk with us. As it happens we very much need to talk.’

  Pazel looked up. ‘This is about Thasha, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Hercol. ‘Along with Neeps, we are her closest friends. And you of course are more than a friend.’

  Pazel said nothing to that. He loved these two, but he had become wary of them both. In the bitter end he feared they might be capable of sacrificing Thasha. That did not make them evil; it might even make them what Alifros needed to survive. Rin knew Thasha was capable of sacrificing herself. But he, Pazel, could not sacrifice her. Not unless he could go with her, into whatever death or transformation she faced.

  ‘This wall inside Thasha-’ Ramachni began.

  ‘I’ve told you what Erithusme said five times over,’ said Pazel. ‘It’s between them, and it won’t let them trade places. It won’t let Thasha hide in that “cave” in her mind, or let Erithusme take control of her body and come fully back to life. And that’s all. Thasha can barely feel the thing; Erithusme can’t find out what it is. Maybe Thasha built it herself, unconsciously. Or maybe Arunis put it inside her somehow, before he died.’

  ‘I do not know if he ever had such power,’ said Ramachni, ‘and even if he did, to implant such a spell would have required him to touch her, and for rather longer than an instant.’ The mage looked at each of them. ‘Has he ever done so?’

  Hercol shook his head. ‘Never.’

  Pazel agreed. ‘And he could have, when we were locked up in Masalym. He never tried.’

  ‘When we fought him on the Chathrand, he summoned darkness, just before he fled the ship,’ said Hercol. ‘He might have touched Thasha then. But the darkness was brief, and he was desperate, fighting for his life against us all.’

  ‘The spell could have reached Thasha by means of an object, if she kept it on her person long enough,’ said Ramachni. ‘That was his approach with her mother’s necklace. But when he cursed the necklace Arunis did not know of the connection between Thasha and Erithusme. You witnessed his shock on Dhola’s Rib, when he glimpsed the truth at last. Think carefully: has she been given anything else that might have come from the sorcerer?’

  ‘No,’ said Pazel.

  ‘No,’ agreed Hercol. ‘Since the incident with the necklace, Thasha has been wary of gifts from any quarter, I am glad to say. However-’ He paused, glancing uneasily at Pazel.

  ‘Go on, say it.’

  ‘What if the object was Fulbreech?’

  ‘Fulbreech?’ cried Pazel.

  ‘He was, after all, the sorcerer’s tool,’ said Hercol.

  And he touched her, thought Pazel, feeling suddenly ill. Many times. For longer than an instant.

  ‘If Arunis had the power to infect her mind at all, Fulbreech could indeed have been the agent,’ said Ramachni. ‘Pazel, have you spoken to her of those encounters?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘She would have felt the magical intrusion, for a moment at least. One of us must ask her.’

  Pazel took a deep breath. ‘She’s ashamed of the whole business,’ he said. ‘Of course she shouldn’t be; she was brilliant. But playing along with his lies, pretending to want him, to be under his spell — honestly, Hercol, it’s about the nastiest thing you could have asked her to do.’

  ‘And you and she both know why I did so,’ said Hercol.

  Pazel nodded, reluctantly. By playing Fulbreech, they had almost succeeded in killing Arunis back on the Chathrand. And would have, he recalled bitterly, if he, Pazel, had not interfered.

  ‘I will speak to Thasha,’ said Hercol. ‘Pazel is right: I put her up to the foul game.’

  Ramachni shook his head. ‘On second thought, I think it must be me. This is a matter of spells, and my questions to her may be more precise. Besides, I will not shame her. There are some advantages to not being human.’

  They passed on through the trees, through the rich smell of loam and the flutter of unseen wings. ‘Ramachni,’ said Pazel at last, ‘do you trust her, completely?’

  ‘What a question!’ said the mage. ‘Thasha has proven herself beyond my wildest hopes. I would place the fate of all the worlds in her hand without a moment’s hesitation, if I could.’

  Pazel looked at him keenly. ‘I was talking about Erithusme,’ he said. ‘Can you say as much about her?’

  Ramachni stopped walking.

  ‘Because I just remembered,’ said Pazel, ‘how you didn’t know who had created the magic wall around the Chathrand’s stateroom. And it was Erithusme; she told me so. It’s a bit odd that she kept something like that from you, don’t you think?’

  Ramachni’s deep black eyes fixed on him. ‘Listen to me, lad,’ he said. ‘Since the dawn of woken life on Alifros, in days so ancient even the selk have forgotten them, only a handful of beings have ever been born with utter mastery of magic inscribed in their souls. Erithusme is one. She did not know the power latent in her until the Nilstone awakened it — that is true. But what matters is that she never let the Stone enslave her. What matters is that she was noble enough to be satisfied with greatness and spurn omnipotence. A lesser being would have clung to the Nilstone even as it killed her, built keeps and castles, raised enfortressed islands in which to guard the cursed thing. Erithusme gave it up. She knew its rightful place was not Alifros but the land of the dead, and tried to send it there. What further proof of her intentions do you require?’

  Pazel had no answer. He did require more, but how to ask for it? Even Ramachni might have a blind spot, and if he did it was surely for his mistress, the one who trained him as a mage.

  ‘Some day,’ he said, ‘I’d like to hear the story of your childhood, Ramachni.’

  ‘I shall be glad to tell you, at the appropriate time,’ said Ramachni. ‘Perhaps if we rejoin the ship, and start the crossing, and lie becalmed for half a year upon the Ruling Sea.’

  Pazel smiled, but could not laugh. He was uneasy still. Then he heard footfalls behind him. To his surprise it was Neda, running to catch up with them, and for once unescorted. When she arrived she amazed him further by kissing him on both cheeks, and then looking at him with the plain, frank, critical eye of an older sister, rather than that of a warrior, or a priest.

  He studied her, alarmed. There was something in her face that was liberated, or unhinged. ‘Neda,’ he said, ‘what in Pitfire’s happened to you?’

  ‘I spoke with our mother,’ she said.

  Thasha and Neeps saw the wolves before they saw the temple. They were still in the bamboo grove. A pair of the regal animals, coal-black and chalk-white, bounded onto the trail.

  ‘Welcome, rare birds of the North,’ said the white wolf. ‘Valgrif spoke of you, but we have only seen the little ones — the women so small our cubs try to pounce on them. Come quickly: Lord Arim awaits.’

  Thehel Bledd was a large complex with several halls, and many long rectangular pools that mirrored the surrounding mountains, and marble terraces of differing heights that stood open to the sky. Parts of the temple grounds were half lost in vines and creepers and the ubiquitous bamboo; others, swept clean, appeared to enjoy more frequent use. Many wolves padded through the temple, watching them with bright, intelligent eyes.

  Rounding the corner of a large hall they came suddenly on Pazel and Neda. ‘Thasha!’ Pazel cried. ‘Come here, listen to Neda! You won’t believe your ears!’

  Neda was changed — there was a directness to her look that Thasha had never seen before — and what she told them changed Thasha too, or at least made her weep with joy and longing. She asked Neda repeat it again and again, in her poor Arquali, until Pazel could not stand it and rattled it all off in one breath.

  ‘Is true, sister,’ said Neda, aglow. ‘Your father being fine.
’

  ‘But — friends?’ said Neeps, looking at them dubiously. ‘Her dad, and your witch-mum?’

  ‘Why not?’ said Pazel. ‘Mom’s a little crazy-’

  ‘Very crazy,’ said Neda.

  ‘-but she’s never been a fool. And the admiral, why, he’s capable of anything.’

  ‘Is what mother saying, too,’ said Neda.

  ‘And Maisa,’ said Thasha, ‘hiding out in the blary Fens. It’s a blary miracle. Pazel, we have to tell Hercol.’

  ‘I am telling,’ said Neda.

  ‘She means she told him already,’ said Pazel.

  Neda looked at Thasha curiously. ‘When I am saying “Empress Maisa” I think Hercol getting cry. But no, no tears.’

  ‘What did he do?’ said Thasha.

  Neda looked unsettled. ‘He being quiet; then praying little bit. Then saying if I not sfvantskor he kissing me like no woman ever before his life.’

  They might have talked a great deal longer, but the wolves urged them on. A moment later Valgrif himself bounded into view. ‘Good!’ he said. ‘Now you are all accounted for, save Sergeant Lunja. Come, we are about to begin.’

  ‘Valgrif, you’re hurt,’ said Neeps. And so he was: a white bandage had been tied about his ankle, and his ear was torn.

  ‘I have killed five servants of the Raven Society,’ said the wolf. ‘Four fell quickly, but the last was a terrible dog, an athymar. That battle was ugly, but I prevailed, and the bodies will never be found. Lord Arim sent many wolves to the mountains. They are all back now, save my sons — and all with evil news I fear.’

  The wolves led them through a few more twists and turns, and at last through a stone gate. Beyond, a crumbling stair led down to what Thasha presumed was the temple’s innermost terrace. Here a round stone table awaited them, upon which fruit and bread and decanters of selk wine had been set. The other travellers, except for Lunja, were here already. There were also some half-dozen selk, among them Thaulinin and Lord Arim. Nolcindar was not present; in fact Thasha realised that she had not seen the warrior for many days.

  ‘Citizens,’ said Lord Arim, ‘you deserve full honours and a splendid farewell. Indeed, I had hoped to show you something of the esteem we hold you in — you who felled Arunis, and recovered the Stone from his keeping. But that cannot be. We must have a war-council, and a brief one at that. One of you is missing, but we dare not wait for her. Come and drink a cup with us, and let us begin.’

  ‘What’s keeping Lunja?’ Neeps murmured to Thasha. ‘She only meant to go and bathe in the stream. She shouldn’t be this late.’

  The selk poured everyone a cup of dark wine — even the wolves drank a little, from a brass bowl on the terrace. Then Thaulinin helped Lord Arim to a chair, and the others sat down as well. Ramachni leaped onto the table and sat between Thasha and Hercol. The ixchel settled beside the mage.

  ‘You have heard,’ said Lord Arim, ‘that we sent scouts into the world beyond. Now they have spoken: Ularamyth is all but surrounded. Macadra may have learned that the Nilstone came inland with the sorcerer, or she may still be uncertain whether it did so or was taken from Masalym aboard your ship. But either way she has landed forces in the Peninsula on a scale never seen before. No, they will not find the Secret Vale, but there can hardly be a path between here and the coast that her forces are not watching. No great legions of soldiers await us: the land is too extensive for that. Macadra has rather spread her forces thin, like the strands of a spider web — and therein lies the danger. Is it not so, Ambrimar’s son?’

  ‘It is, Lord,’ said Thaulinin, ‘for while there are many paths to the sea, Macadra too has her riders, and they are swift. And should they spot us on any of those paths, those riders will fly before us, sounding the alarm, and her forces will converge between us and the path we have chosen. And remember that those paths are long. We might kill any number of her servants, but we will not kill unnoticed for sixteen days running, all the way to the Ilidron Coves. If we disturb Macadra’s web but once, we will never reach the sea.’

  ‘And we do not have sixteen days,’ said Hercol. ‘For after the march there is a great sea journey we must somehow accomplish. And with every hour that passes the Great Ship moves a bit further north.’

  ‘I told you, swordsman,’ said Cayer Vispek, looking sternly at Hercol. ‘We have lingered too long in this place of soft beds and sweet music! It has lulled us to sleep, or into pastimes unworthy of us. And now the length of the road dismays you? Thaulinin warned us of it when we met him on Sirafstoran Torr.’

  ‘I do not speak in dismay,’ said Hercol, ‘only in observance of fact. Sixteen days is too long.’

  ‘If you would blame someone for the length of our stay, Cayer, blame me,’ said Ramachni. ‘I counselled against moving in ignorance, and nothing else could we have done before the return of Lord Arim’s scouts. But it is true that we have run out of time. The Chathrand’s northward progress is one reason. Another is the growth of the Swarm of Night.’

  He looked at the assembled faces. ‘You know what the Swarm is, and you know Arunis dredged the River of Shadows until he found it, and used the power of the Nilstone to bring it forth. Some of you know as well that our hosts have seen it from the mountaintops in recent days. Now I will tell you how it kills — and why.

  ‘The Swarm was created to patrol the border of death’s kingdom, to stop the dead from spilling out into Agaroth, and attempting to migrate back in the direction of the living lands. Whenever a breach in the border wall appears, the Swarm falls upon any of the dead who pass through it, and drives them back to their proper place. The larger the breach, the stronger the Swarm grows in order to contain it. But in the living world all of this goes awry. Death still attracts the Swarm, and death’s dark energy can still feed it and make it grow. Small or scattered deaths will pass unnoticed: their energy will still leave Alifros in the natural way, along with the spirits of the deceased. But a great catastrophe — a war, a famine, an earthquake — is quite different. The Swarm flies to such horrors, and if they are still unfolding, it drops upon them and makes them complete.’

  ‘Complete?’ said Big Skip. ‘You mean it kills everyone that hasn’t yet been killed?’

  ‘Everyone and everything within its compass,’ said Ramachni. ‘Trees, grass, insects, people. And then, like a sated vulture, it rises again into the clouds and moves on.’

  ‘It has already happened at least once,’ said Thaulinin. ‘Our scouts listened to the fireside grumblings of the enemy. Several times they spoke of a “cloud of death” that had ended the fighting in Karysk, along with most of Bali Adro’s terrible armada.’

  ‘This Swarm sounds almost like a peacemaker,’ said Corporal Mandric.

  ‘It could have that effect for a time,’ said Ramachni, ‘if all the warlords in Alifros somehow learned of their peril. But I fear we would not be safe for long. There is no way to be certain, but my guess is that the Swarm only ignores the little deaths because the larger call to it so loudly. If wars ceased, it would begin to harvest death from smaller conflicts, minor plagues. And in time darkness itself will become the killer, as crops and forest die in its shadow.’

  ‘Watchers above!’ said Bolutu. ‘Surely it will never grow that large!’

  ‘Will it not?’ Ramachni glanced about the table, his eyes settling at last on the bowls of fruit. ‘Consider those grapes, Mr Bolutu: how many would it take to cover the table?’

  ‘Entirely?’ said Bolutu. ‘That’s hard to guess, Ramachni. Thousands, surely.’

  ‘Let us say ten thousand. And let us imagine we start with one grape, and double the number each day. Think back to your early arithmetic: how long will it take?’

  ‘Fourteen days,’ said Neda. There were startled glances, but Neda shrugged. ‘Very simple problem. Only double and double: two, four, eight, sixteen-’

  ‘And so on,’ said Ramachni. ‘Fortunately even this scale is deceptive: if the table stands for Alifros, the Swarm today is still no larger tha
n a grain of sand. And on many days it will feed on nothing, but merely fly toward the next battle or site of pestilence. We need not measure our time in days, just yet — but we dare not measure it in years. Six months from now, Arunis will have joined the Night Gods, and this world will be a black and lifeless grave.’

  There were sighs and looks of horror, as though the mage had stabbed them with his words. Pazel thought of all the quite days in Ularamyth and felt a pang of guilt. He had not wanted to hasten their passing. He had not wanted to think about the Swarm.

  ‘At the very least, our task is clear,’ said Hercol. ‘We must make haste to Gurishal, and give the Nilstone back to death.’

  ‘This might be a good moment to tell us how,’ said Thasha, ‘or at least how we’re to reach the coast.’

  ‘Mr Pathkendle is quite correct,’ said Lord Arim, ‘and here is the best answer we have found: it is true that Macadra is watching every sensible path. But there remains one, rather less sensible, that she may have forgotten.’

  He rose stiffly from his chair and pointed northwards. High on the crater’s rim, Thasha could just make out the dark triangular doorway in the mountain’s wall.

  ‘The Nine Peaks Road,’ said Lord Arim, ‘or as we call it, Alet Ithar, the Sky Road. It is a remote and treacherous path, though part of it follows the Royal Highway that linked the halls of the Mountain Kings. Ages have passed since those kingdoms fell. The Highway is lost in many places: bridges have fallen, forests regrown; earthquakes have changed the shape of the peaks. Today only the selk continue to speak of a road at all. Yet with skill and daring one can still pass that way — at least until the deep snows drape the mountains. And that is a third and final reason to hurry: as you can see, the snows have already begun.’

  ‘The path is certainly treacherous,’ said Ramachni, ‘but it is also a shortcut. By that path, and the wild lowlands beyond, we may come to the Gulf of Ilidron in a mere nine or ten days.’