The forest was silent, watchful. Caelum walked slowly though the outer groves, nodding to the few Avar standing about their edges. They watched him suspiciously, turning to murmur to their companions as he passed.
There were several score Avar in the Earth Tree Grove itself. They stood about in small, silent groups before the stone circle that ringed the massive Earth Tree. As Caelum stepped into the grove, they all turned to stare at him, their dark faces impassive, their hands folding before them.
Keeping his own face expressionless and his gait steady, Caelum walked into the open space before the stone circle. He glanced at the watching crowd, then looked at the stone circle. Just inside he could see Isfrael, sitting a wooden throne placed underneath the Earth Tree herself. Standing slightly behind his right shoulder was Shra. Taking a deep breath, Caelum walked underneath one of the stone arches and stopped a few paces away from Isfrael’s throne.
“Brother,” he said by way of greeting, and inclined his head.
“What do you here?” Isfrael asked bluntly, and Caelum suppressed a wince. Should he have asked permission before stepping into these groves? No! Why should he of all people?
“Zared has proclaimed himself King of Achar and –”
“So I have heard,” Isfrael said.
It did not occur to Caelum to wonder how Isfrael had heard.
“So now we have a King of Achar again,” Isfrael continued. “What are his intentions?”
“Who knows what he plans,” Caelum said. “And who knows if your forests are safe. I go to stop him now. And thus to my purpose –”
“No.”
“You don’t know what I –”
“I know. Our father asked the same of the Avar, and he was denied as well. I will not help you in this war. We are not a fighting people.”
“You owe me loyalty!”
“I owe you nothing! I have never offered fealty and homage, Caelum. Not to you, not to our father.”
“Isfrael, please…”
“No.”
“What if Zared comes to destroy the forests?”
Isfrael studied Caelum carefully. “I do not think Zared would do that.”
“But –”
“Zared is your problem, Caelum, not mine. He does not become my problem until I see the sparkle of axes in my forests. I will not send my people out to fight someone else’s war. Do you understand?”
“Then damn you, too,” Caelum said bitterly, and turned his back on his brother.
Isfrael sat and watched Caelum stalk towards the edge of the grove, and then fade out of view as he worked the Song of Movement.
“He has a lot to learn,” Shra said softly.
Isfrael thought for a while before answering. “He will always do his best,” he finally said, “although I wonder if his best is going to be good enough.”
There was a step behind them, and an Icarii birdman emerged from behind the Earth Tree.
It was WingRidge CurlClaw, Captain of the Lake Guard.
“I do thank you,” he said, bowing deeply before Isfrael.
“I would not have helped him in any case,” Isfrael said. “The Avar will never take up weapons and stalk the field of war.”
Isfrael paused and watched WingRidge carefully. “You are an interesting young man,” he said eventually. “And you serve your master well.”
“I am bound to his service,” WingRidge said. “But it has been hard sometimes.”
Isfrael nodded sympathetically. “He will understand that eventually,” he said, then waved the birdman away.
54
Journeying through the Night
Faraday slipped quietly into the room and sank down into the chair by Niah’s bed. The woman was alone.
Over the four weeks of nights that Faraday had come in here, she had occasionally found WolfStar tangled about Niah, but his visits were becoming rarer, and Faraday supposed he had more urgent business elsewhere.
Niah was sleeping badly. She murmured and tossed, and by the sheen of the moon Faraday could see that the woman was perspiring lightly. One hand lay resting on her by now slightly distended belly.
No doubt she feared sleep, yet did not know why.
Faraday smiled, and prepared herself to enter the dream world. Every night Zenith took another step closer, every night Niah was pushed just that bit closer to the baby. Step by step.
Closer to entrapment.
Faraday closed her eyes.
When she opened them again she found herself in the misty world of the shadow-lands.
About her bustled – and yet drifted – the dream reflection of Ysbadd. People moved from shop door to window, from street corner to boudoir, from wharf to store room. All moved slowly, hesitatingly, as if they had forgotten their purpose, and yet somehow all arrived at their destination.
Faraday wandered the streets, ignoring, and being ignored by, all those who drifted past her.
Ah, there was Zenith. Under the awning, its canvas flapping inconsonantly in this most visionary of domains, where she had stopped last night, unable to take another step.
Faraday moved to her side. “Zenith.”
Zenith lifted her eyes and stared at Faraday. Then she smiled, slowly and hesitatingly. She had only been smiling since the plains of Tarantaise. It was a good sign.
Faraday took her hand, and then leaned forward and hugged her. “Niah worries, yet does not understand the reason for it. She walks through her days, her eyes flitting over her shoulder, gasping at breezes in shadows. She is losing, Zenith. She is losing.”
“And the baby grows?”
“Healthy and ever receptive. But we must be quick, for the baby is approaching the stage of its growth where it can be inhabited by a spirit. And you and I know which spirit we want to inhabit it.”
Zenith nodded, and looked down the street. “I feel stronger tonight, Faraday. I can surely walk to the wharves.”
“Good! Zenith, if you can walk to the wharves, then I can find you passage. Imagine, all the way to the Isle of Mist and Memory! For once you need take no steps.”
Zenith gave an almost predatory smile. She could sense victory, and it lent her strength. She had no guilt about what she was going to do. Niah had felt nothing but triumph in possessing her and in spiriting her into this dream-world prison.
“Then let us make a start,” she said and, leaning on Faraday, she took a step forward.
The way was fraught with difficulties. As with each night’s journey over the past two weeks, Zenith found every step agonising, so difficult that her breath wheezed in and out of her lungs, and her fingers dug into Faraday’s arms and shoulders with the strength of her distress. Some steps Faraday thought Zenith was about to collapse, but then Zenith would somehow find the strength to stumble forward. They moved through the streets, each movement a torment, no other thought on their minds but that Zenith must lift one leg and put the next foot forward, and then transfer weight to it, and then find the strength to use it to spring her into another step, and then another, and so onwards, ever onwards. Until finally…
“Faraday, I cannot go on! This must be it for tonight. I am sorry, I cannot…”
“Look, Zenith!” Faraday grasped Zenith’s chin in fierce fingers and forced her head up. “See? Five more steps and we are at the wharf!”
“Five steps too many, Faraday. Tonight I must rest here. I must. I –”
“Then prepare to live your life, your eternity, locked in this shadow-world! The baby grows apace, Zenith. We cannot leave it too much longer. A week, ten days at the most, and some other spirit will inhabit it! I cannot keep them at bay for much longer. Get to the wharf, Zenith, or I swear I will not return tomorrow night!”
Zenith wailed, and Faraday’s heart turned over in sorrow and pity for her, but she let none of it show on her face.
“Move!” she hissed. “Now!”
And Zenith put another foot forward, screaming with the pain, but Faraday urged her on, and somehow she got another foot forwa
rd, even though her leg was trembling so badly Faraday thought it would never bear her weight.
But it did, and then they were only three steps from the wharf.
Again Faraday’s fingers bit painfully into Zenith’s face. “Look!”
And Zenith raised her head and looked.
There, bobbing in the grey sea, was a boat. A small boat, a lantern in its prow. A flat-bottomed ferry.
Zenith took another step, and bent double and groaned with the pain. But again she raised her head and looked.
“Where did that come from, Faraday?”
“It had lost its owner,” Faraday said. “And, lost, it needed a purpose. So I summoned it. Come, two more steps.”
They were two more steps that almost tore Zenith apart, but she took them. She sobbed as she sank down on the ferry’s cushions, and Faraday climbed in beside her and cast off the rope from the wharf.
“I will ride with you a way,” she said, “before I return. And tomorrow night…tomorrow night I will greet you at the pier of Pirates’ Town. Oh, Zenith, there, there. No need to cry, it will soon be over. All will be well soon, I promise.”
She took Zenith’s head and placed it in her lap, and she let Zenith sob until she fell into an exhausted sleep.
Faraday sat there a long time, watching the grey waters drift past, lost in the shadow-sea between the coastline of Nor and the Isle of Mist and Memory. She sat there until she felt the approach of dawn in the world of the waking, and then she vanished, leaving Zenith to travel the shadow-seas by herself.
The dawn was still and cold, and Faraday stood at the lip of the southern cliff of the mount, seeming not to notice the thousand-foot drop beneath her. She shivered, more in delight than discomfort, and wrapped her arms about herself. She loved standing here, looking out into the great southern ocean, watching the waves roll in, feeling the salty wind push back her hair.
It smelt of freedom. If she wished she could step off the cliff and die, or she could turn and walk back to the priestesses’ dormitory for breakfast.
Which?
She laughed, revelling in the fact that she had a choice, and felt rather than heard StarDrifter land on the grass behind her.
She half turned her head and grinned. “Come to save me, StarDrifter?”
He returned her smile briefly, took the step between them and wrapped his arms about her.
“You’re cold.”
“I’m alive.”
His arms tightened, and Faraday relaxed back into them. Faraday shared a deep companionship with StarDrifter. A friend, she thought, for all life and through all future lives.
“Zenith is closer,” she murmured, and his arms tightened.
“Where?”
“Drifting the shadow-seas between Nor and this island.”
“When?” His voice was tight, anxious.
“I hope to find her on the shadow-pier of Pirates’ Town tonight.”
“And then it will be only days until she reaches the Mount?”
“Only days, StarDrifter. You will have your granddaughter back soon.”
“Axis and Azhure should be caring for her, helping her to find her way home.”
Faraday was silent for a long moment, then she shrugged in his arms. “We love her, StarDrifter, and we help her.”
They stood a while in silence, then Faraday became aware that StarDrifter was distracted, and very, very worried.
“What is it?” she asked.
StarDrifter stood back. “Faraday, at dawn one of the priestesses hurried into my chamber. She had disturbing news.”
“What?”
He took a great breath. “There is something wrong with the Temple of the Stars.”
55
The Blighted Beacon
StarDrifter led her up the small rise towards the Temple of the Stars, and Faraday realised as soon as she saw it that something was indeed badly wrong.
The Temple was constructed entirely of a great beacon of cobalt light that speared into the sky. Within the light, stars danced and swayed.
But today a dark stain also danced and swayed within the light. It had cut a great swathe through the beacon, consuming ribbons of stars and, in two instances, entire galaxies.
“What is it?” StarDrifter whispered. “What? I can feel it reflected in my own soul, and it mutes the sound of the Star Dance. Faraday, I have not thought to worry you, but over past weeks I have felt something wrong with my own powers, and all the other Enchanters on the island have felt much the same. I had wondered if it was WolfStar, perhaps, playing his tricks, but now I realise it has been caused by this…this cancer that eats its way through the stars. See how the beacon flickers! What is it?”
Faraday chewed her lip. Had Drago somehow done this? No, she thought not…not with what Noah had told her about him. But Drago was surely, surely caught up in it.
“What is wrong,” StarDrifter cried, “to have caused this?”
“What is wrong, StarDrifter?” Axis’ angry voice said behind them. “Demons come to destroy the Star Dance and ravage this world, that is what is wrong. And Drago leads them.”
Faraday and StarDrifter turned around. Axis and Azhure stood a few paces away. Both their faces were hard, their eyes angry.
Axis shifted his gaze from his father to stare at Faraday. The last time he’d seen her in the flesh had been in Gorgrael’s chamber, watching him rip her to shreds in a futile attempt to stop Axis from destroying him.
And here she stood again, serene, lovelier than he remembered, and standing too familiarly close to his father. Axis had thought himself immune to jealousy, had thought himself over his love for Faraday, but now he found himself seething with some undefinable anger. Faraday…and his father?
“Faraday?” Azhure asked. “What are you doing back in human form?”
“I’m free,” Faraday said.
“How?”
“Azhure, what does it matter ‘how’?”
“Ah!” StarDrifter said impatiently. “Axis, explain this!” And his hand swept towards the blight in the beacon.
Speaking in short, terse sentences, Axis told Faraday and StarDrifter what the Star Gods had learned from WolfStar. Demons. TimeKeepers. Come for Qeteb. Their approach blocking out the Star Dance. A future bleaker than the worst black ice.
StarDrifter stood appalled, his mind racing to comprehend what Axis was telling him. A future without the Star Dance? Without enchantments?
Faraday, on the other hand, nodded quietly to herself. It explained a great deal to her about Drago.
Azhure saw her reaction, and her mouth thinned. “You saw Drago,” she said. “In the Star Gate chamber.”
Faraday sighed. “Yes.”
“Do you know what he has done?”
Faraday blinked at the anger in Azhure’s voice. “No. Tell us, what has Drago done?”
“He has murdered RiverStar –” Axis said.
“I have heard he was so accused,” Faraday said quietly.
“– and Orr and he is now well on the way to destroying all I have built, all we fought for –”
“And died for,” Faraday observed.
“Drago is intent on the utter destruction of Tencendor!” Axis shouted. “See that blight? It is Drago’s doing!”
“No,” Faraday said quietly. “I cannot believe that.”
Axis battled with his fury. “How is it that you stand there, Faraday, with your face so serene, and condone all that he has done!”
Faraday raised an eyebrow. “I? Condone?”
“You have protected him,” Azhure said, her tone flat. “You told WolfStar that he had fled back through one of the passageways that connects the Star Gate with the outer world. Yet we know he went through the Star Gate. Why did you lie to protect him?”
Faraday stood silent, thinking of how she could answer. So many people misunderstood Drago. His parents. Caelum. WolfStar. Faraday could not blame them, for as yet they did not understand what she did. Yet she had no right to reveal Noah’s
confidences, to explain that Drago was not quite the enemy most thought.
She almost smiled. Sometimes it paid to lie down with the enemy.
“I thought,” she eventually answered, her voice very even, “that Drago deserved to be protected by someone, just as Zenith deserves to be protected and loved.”
Azhure blinked. “Zenith?”
Axis ignored the sudden change in topic. “Drago,” he hissed through clenched teeth, “currently leads a group of murderous Demons to the Star Gate so he can gain Tencendor for his own!”
“Only Caelum can face them,” Azhure added. “Yet he needs the Rainbow Sceptre – and Drago has handed it to the Demons!”
“Then you have a troublesome puzzle to solve,” Faraday said lightly. “But how can StarDrifter and I help? We have our own problems here.”
“Damn you!” Axis cried, and looked at his father. “StarDrifter? Every Enchanter’s powers are fading, as are ours! This is going to become your problem, whether you like it or not.”
“Faraday,” StarDrifter said softly. “Perhaps it would be best to tell Axis what you can.”
She shrugged, and looked at Axis. “What do you want to know, Axis?”
He suppressed a movement of irritation. “Tell us what else you know about Drago,” he said. “What did he say? What did he do? What is his purpose?”
“Drago has ever kept his purpose to himself, it seems,” Faraday replied. “He did not share his innermost secrets with me, Axis. In fact, he hardly said a word.”
Axis turned away, furious with Faraday that she had lied yet again, furious that she had allied herself with his cursed son. Was this just another revenge to pay him back for his betrayal of her? Was she prepared to watch Tencendor torn apart to gain her feminine satisfaction?
“Axis,” StarDrifter said, “what can we do? About the Demons, about the loss of power, about…” and he gestured towards the beacon.
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