by Greg Curtis
“Can you do something for the pain?” the wife of the man she was tending to asked, as she sat beside her husband on the grass, distracting Carrie. The woman's face was a picture of misery. “He won't ask cos’ he's too stubborn, but he's hurting.”
“Of course.” Carrie cast another spell on him to block the pain, and watched her patient relax a little. It wouldn't save him – the man's gut had been punctured and even though the surgeons had done their best the poisons in it had leaked out into his body and he would be unlikely to survive many more days – but if it helped with the pain then that was something. And the man had already survived three days. Perhaps he would survive after all?
“Thank you, lass.” The woman bent down over her husband and kissed him on the forehead. She never noticed the way her words caused Carrie to wince.
Those few words were like a knife in her heart. She hated them as she had never hated anything else before. But she kept her pain to herself, as she moved on to her next patient – a man with badly broken legs. He would survive thankfully, though she doubted he'd ever walk again easily. The physicians had set his bones and applied splints to hold them. But it was never a good sign when the bones that had to be reset had been poking through the skin. Carrie cast some more spells to aid the bone in knitting itself back together, to hold the demons of fever away and another to ease the pain and help him rest. Above all else he needed to rest.
Even while she worked on him, Carrie was keenly aware that she still had another three hundred patients to tend to. It would only be after she had seen them all – she estimated that that would take another six hours – that she would sit down, have a cup of tea and something to eat. And then she would start again.
“Don't you dare thank her woman – this is all her fault!”
Carrie looked up to see her most difficult patient standing in front of her. He had one arm in a sling, one side of his face was completely black and blue, the eye was blood shot, and he could only walk with a crutch. But he still had enough strength to hurl accusations at her – which he did regularly.
“Lord Baraman,” she answered him politely. She was too tired to argue. “You should rest.”
And by the gods did she want him to do that! She needed to help these people. And she really wasn’t up to facing more of his accusations. Especially when they ran so close to the bone. It made her casting more difficult. But now that he was up and walking thanks to his crutch she guessed he was just going to add to her trouble. And yet ironically of the two lords who had been in Coldwater, he was the one who was going to cause her the least pain. It was the impact of Lord Ironbelly that she truly feared. Because Lord Ironbelly was missing and presumed dead. The killing of the King’s Right Hand was tantamount to treason. Any doubts about her grandfather’s life now being forfeit had been swept away when she had heard of his fate. The army would be sent in.
“Bah! I've had enough rest Girl! I want to talk about what you're going to do about this monster of yours!” He practically spat at her as he demanded her help.
Lord Baraman was not a nice man she had discovered. He had reason to be angry, of course. But his anger was out of control. And the way he dealt with people was appalling. Even people with whom he had no axe to grind he shouted at and cursed. And despite having been told to keep his voice down so that people could rest, he refused. He shouted and screamed and woke them all up. He simply didn't care. Maybe he felt that because he was of noble blood it gave him the right?
“I can't do anything.” Carrie told him tiredly, just as she had told him many times before. “I don't control him. And I didn't create him. And before you ask once again; no, I don't know how to stop him. I wish I did.”
“You mean you won't tell us Girl.” He emphasised the “won't”.
“No. I mean I can't! I don't know how he's doing what he's doing. I mean look for yourself!” She swept her arm in the direction of the town. Toward the whirling storm of darkness and orange fire permanently above it. “That's just … insane! Until I saw that I wouldn’t have believed that any wizard could do something like that!”
“I also can't stop him. I can't even get near enough to him to talk to him. I've tried, believe me. But I'm no more welcome in town than anyone else. I've had to run from those damned ice golems like everyone else.”
She wasn't lying. She had tried at the start. When the dust had settled enough for her to see, and she'd been able to get down out of the tree and treat her injuries, she had tried to re-enter the town. Several times. But the winds and the ice golems had come for her before she'd got very far and she'd had to run. She doubted her grandfather had sent them after her deliberately. But they guarded the town from everyone. No one could enter Coldwater. And that included her.
But even if I could reach him he wouldn't listen,” Carrie concluded. “I’ve tried talking him out of his mania before and it hasn’t worked.” “
You're lying. You'd say anything to protect that worthless killer.”
“I'm not lying.” But her words lacked conviction as she knew there was still some truth in his charge. It hurt her. She did not want her grandfather to die. Not even after all he'd done and all he'd threatened to do. In the end he was still her grandfather. Unfortunately, the Lord saw that in her.
“But you'll protect him!”
Carrie stood there for a moment, bent over her patient, carefully thinking over her reply. When the words finally came, they were words she'd never wanted to say. But they were the truth.
“Lord Baraman,” Carrie stood up straight and then turned to stare directly at him so he could see the truth in her face. “Your son was a good man. A better man than you know. Good and noble. Kind and generous of spirit. Clever too. I miss him dearly. I wept when he was struck down. And I know you must miss him too.”
“But you have other children. Grandchildren. A wife. Brothers and sisters. In-laws. I on the other hand have no one. No brothers or sisters. No husband or children. No parents. No aunts and uncles. No other grandparents. Wilberforce Wilberton is my only family. He raised me from childhood. He is all I have. And I love him.”
“You cannot expect me to help you kill him. That is beyond unfair.” She took a deep breath. “I will however do everything I can to help stop him. I'll also help the wounded. And I'll tell you all that I know.”
“I'm sorry for your loss. I miss Edrick too. And I'm sorry if that's not enough for you. But I can’t do anything more than what I already am.”
She knew even as she said it, that Lord Baraman wasn’t going to be appeased by her words. He would not be happy until blood had been spilled for the blood he had lost. And it struck her as ironic that he should feel that way when he had been the one to drive his own son away in the first place. People were complicated.
“Yes you can!” He shouted some more. “You can answer the King's questions!”
The Lord gave a nod and unexpectedly a pair of soldiers she hadn't noticed grabbed her from behind, cruelly forced her arms behind her back, and then lashed her wrists together.
Carrie cried out in shock and pain. And in outrage. This should not be happening! And yet it was. But even as she opened her mouth to scream someone punched her in the stomach, driving the air from her lungs and then forced a foul-tasting gag into her mouth and tied it behind her head. Moments later a bag was shoved over her head, a rope drawn tight around her waist, and her ankles were lashed together. The soldiers were brutally efficient as they bound her. Cruel too as the bindings cut into her skin.
In a matter of seconds she’d been taken prisoner. Without the ability to speak or move she couldn't cast. She couldn't scream or run. She couldn't see. She could barely even breathe. And though Carrie struggled desperately against her bindings as she struggled for breath, she couldn't get free.
Moments later she was picked up and thrown over one of the soldiers’ shoulders, and while she knew it was pointless, she continued to struggle. Her efforts just annoyed the soldiers, and unexpectedly she wa
s dropped to the ground. Then she felt something hard – a boot perhaps – smash into her gut, causing her to double over as it drove all the air from her lungs once again.
That ended her brief spurt of resistance. Once again she was picked up and thrown over someone's shoulder and this time she couldn't struggle. It was all she could do not to be sick. With a gag in her mouth she knew that another blow like that might just kill her. Instead of struggling she focused intently on simply trying to breathe. It was hard because the air was already foul in the bag, thanks to whatever the bag had been used to hold before. But the air wouldn't come and as the longest minutes dragged by she began to panic as she thought she was dying.
Praise Lady Light, she was able to control herself until the air finally did return. But by that time she’d been lashed to the back of a horse. Tied down by yet more ropes around her knees and her middle, to a hard leather saddle.
After that they were off, galloping towards an unknown destination, and all she could do was lie there in pain. But even as she feared whatever fate awaited her, a part of her kept thinking that this was only what she deserved. No matter how horrible things were about to become, she had let her grandfather become the monster he now was and destroy her home and her town. She had let him murder her friends in Coldwater and the Guild. And she had let him kill Edrick.
Maybe it was right that she be punished. Maybe this was justice.
Chapter Fifteen
Finally! He’d found a gate! Edrick cheered as he saw it in the distance. Technically he supposed it wasn't the first gate he'd found. But it was the first one he could use.
He’d found the first gate – at least he assumed it was a gate – in the middle of a small bog. It sat in a tiny valley that was perhaps only a few hundred paces across. It was filled with stagnant water, mud and diseased looking trees that were covered in moss. Somewhere inside that bog the road had ended. He knew that because he'd circled the entire area and found no road leaving it. Of course there might have been a road, but it was simply too deeply buried for his binoculars to show him, but his best guess was that there wasn't. Then again, there was no road leading on past the gate by his home either. So maybe the roads ended at the gates. If so then it seemed likely that what was inside the bog was another gate.
But he hadn't entered it. He hadn't dared. Not when the trees were covered in spider webs. Big spider webs. So big that they covered the trees and the entire bog. So big that he dreaded meeting the spiders that had spun those webs. And he dreaded doing it even more, on foot, unarmed and wading through thick mud, because there was no way the steam wagon could have crossed this terrain. It couldn't even get near it before its wheels started to sink.
Edrick supposed he could have burnt the bog down. Trees burnt. Even wet trees. He expected the spiders would too. And he had a useful fire spell. But he didn't want to destroy any part of this realm. Not even that part.
So he'd backtracked to the circle and tried the next road leading from it. That road also proved to be a dead end, at least for him. Because after three hours in the steam wagon the road had disappeared under a hill, going too deep underground for him to track with his binoculars. No amount of spinning the wheels on the binoculars or driving on over to the far side of the hill and searching could locate the road after the point where it vanished. He suspected that either the gate was actually somewhere beneath the hill and was too deep to reach let alone use or alternatively that the road continued on beyond the hill somewhere, but was too deep to find.
After that he'd returned to the circle and spent the night in its embrace. The next morning he’d spent studying the markings on the different stones, trying to glean their meaning. He hadn't got very far. As with the words and gestures of a spell, the markings also didn't make any sense. Perhaps they weren’t meant to? Maybe the markings were just the result of an ancient enchantment? Maybe, like the words and the gestures of the various spells, they were simply the natural shapes the magic demanded.
That could be important. Because one of the failings of magic – human magic at least – was that it faded. Spells lost their effect over time. So did enchantments – albeit with one exception – the enchantments of the ancient Faerie. Maybe the fact that they engraved their enchantments into stone in accordance with the strange symbols that the magic dictated, was part of the reason why their magic endured? If he ever escaped this realm and returned to Riverlandia, he would have to suggest that to some of the learned wizards of the Guild. Though of course they'd probably laugh at him. They were absolutely certain that the ancient magic language was a language with words and precise gestures. They spent their lives trying to decipher its meaning. His theory that it was simply the instinctual demands of the magic itself, would not be well received.
After failing to make any sense of the markings, he'd got back on his steam wagon and tried the third road leading away. The one that was almost a continuation of the same road he'd taken from his home to get to the circle. And this time after several hours he'd struck gold.
It was different to the only other gate he knew. The stones in front of him were only a foot high for a start, though once he checked it out with his binoculars he realised that that was because these stones were buried deeper still. The stones also weren't standing in a field of long lush green grass Here the ground was little more than bare dirt, rocks and clumps of yellow tussock grass. A few bunches of wild flowers could be seen here and there trying to force their way out of the barren ground. And there were even a few straggly, dried up looking trees. All in all, it didn't look very much like the beautiful Faerie he'd come to know.
Not that Edrick particularly cared. He didn't even care that his companion had vanished. Unicorns it seemed, only had so much curiosity. And when the good grass vanished, so did they. Edrick only cared that on the other side of that gate he would find a way back to his realm. To Coldwater. Or at least to Riverlandia, where he could then make his way home to Coldwater.
Edrick drove the last few hundred yards to the gate and then pulled the wagon to a halt in front of it. He could have simply driven through it he supposed. But he had no idea what was on the other side. He might end up driving into a tree – or a lake. Best, he thought, to do this more cautiously.
He parked the wagon some twenty or thirty yards from the gate and then jumped down, pleased at the chance to stretch his legs. He then walked over to the stones, and then with a touch of his gift, activated it. But then he stopped. What he saw on the other side of the gate confused him.
The world on the other side didn't look like any part of the Riverlandia he knew. There was no forest for a start. No grasslands and rolling meadows. No lakes and rivers. There was nothing that looked like the land near Coldwater. But then there were no towns or cities either. Instead all he could see was rock. Lots and lots of dark, flat rock. In fact, the entire plane was covered in it. It looked like the sort of plateau you sometimes saw around volcanoes after the lava had flowed out over the land and cooled, cracking as it did so. But there were no volcanoes near Coldwater. Not within a hundred leagues.
Curious he stepped across the gate and discovered a new problem. Two actually. The first was that the air stank of brimstone, something that went well with his thought that this was a volcanic plateau of some sort. It was a big one too, since when he spun on his heels to try and get a better view of the land, he could see nothing but more of the dark grey plateau. There was no volcano anywhere that he could see despite the fact that this sort of cracked rock plateau could surely only be formed by one. That couldn't be. And neither could this land be anywhere near to his home. A plateau this big anywhere near Coldwater, he should know of.
The second problem was that he had stepped from daylight in Faeries' realm to night time here. That had never happened before. Always whenever he crossed through the gate, it was the same time of day in both the ancient Faerie realm and Riverlandia. And from all he had read, that was true of every other gate. The theory was that the two wor
lds matched one another geographically and in time, more or less. So, if you travelled one thousand leagues north on one world and then crossed through a gate you would find that you had travelled a thousand leagues north there as well though the time would still be the same. How could it now be night here and just after midday in the realm of the Faerie?
Unless – and the understanding shook him – this wasn't Riverlandia at all.
As he stood there, staring at the endless plateau of fissured, dark grey rock and breathed the foul air, Edrick became more and more convinced of that. It was something that some other wizards had suspected in their writings. That there weren't just two worlds side by side that had been linked by the gates as everyone had thought. That the gates like the portals they could create, also led to other places. But since every gate they had found in Riverlandia had led to the realm of the ancient Faeries, the idea had never been widely accepted. The accepted theory was that the two worlds spun in harmony. But when the Argani had showed up and they clearly didn't belong in either realm but had known about the gates and the ancient Faeries he had had to start thinking that the theory was right. There were at least three worlds linked by the gates. Now that he was here and this world looked nothing like what the Argani had described their world as, he realised there might be more than three. There might be a great many more than three.