by Sam Bowring
Is he really going to fall for this?
They passed more dead Unwoven and Yalenna worried they would fuel Forger’s misgivings. She knew that Rostigan had secretly come here to speak to Salarkis. She wished now, however, that he had done something to hide the bodies.
Yalenna set her jaw firmly. There was no point worrying about things she could not change. She was locked into this, one way or another. She tried her best to seem resolute, as if she suspected the others would turn on her after they succeeded, and yet for the greater good it was a sacrifice she was willing to make.
After a long climb, they reached a room from which steps through a doorway led up to sunlight. Rostigan moved to a cracked porthole passing for a window, to stare out of while he rubbed his chin.
‘I need to centre myself,’ he said. ‘You both head up, if you like. I will follow momentarily.’
‘Of course!’ said Forger. ‘We’ll just head up ahead of you. Yalenna? Ladies first.’
He stood aside from the doorway, holding a hand towards it.
This was never going to work. She and Rostigan had spoken about this moment, of course – he would go last, and she, if they needed her too, would go first. Neither of them thought it likely that Forger would volunteer to lead the way, but perhaps, if she went first, it would demonstrate there was nothing to worry about – as long as Forger followed closely enough that they came within sight of the Wound at roughly the same time. Rostigan could always give Forger a little extra push once he was on the stairs, if he needed one. However, now that they were actually here, she was not so comfortable with the idea. There were too many doubts in her mind, to be the first of them diminished.
‘I think,’ she said, ‘the honour should go to you, Hanry.’
‘No need to call me that outside of mortal company.’
‘But you have come the furthest, given up the most to be here.’
‘I have not given anything up. I will return to it shortly.’
‘Of course.’
Rostigan was trying to catch her eye and urge her up, but she ignored him. Forger glanced at the stairs, made a move as if towards them, but apparently changed his mind. It had been foolishly optimistic to think that he would unsuspectingly bounce on up, and Yalenna had ruined that slim chance anyway, by being cagey about going first.
‘It just doesn’t feel right,’ Forger said, ‘to go ahead alone. We’re all in this together, aren’t we? So, let us take the steps together!’
Yalenna felt some small relief. ‘Yes, together! Come – shall we even link arms?’
Forger laughed harshly and his smile took on a vicious quality. ‘Did you really think me so stupid?’
Yalenna and Rostigan glanced each other.
‘What do you mean?’ said Rostigan.
Forger waved at the doorway and there was a ripple in the air – something had been hovering there indiscernibly, plugging the way.
‘Can you hear us, Salarkis?’ Forger called.
There came a quick scuffle on the roof and, ‘He knows!’ yelled Salarkis. ‘He knows, he knows!’
‘So damnably stupid,’ said Forger, ‘that I would readily volunteer to have my gifts stolen away?’
A loose piece of stone slid out of the floor and flew at Rostigan. He flung up an arm and it cracked against his elbow.
Forger chuckled. ‘You hurt me, brother. I wanted so badly to trust you, yet you lied to me from the start.’
Yalenna shot a hand at the window to summon wind, funnelling it to a concentrated stream, aiming to push Forger towards the stairs. He laughed, gave a wave, and it diverted around him in streams.
‘Oh, how it must have cost you, Priestess, to be nice to me.’
He gestured at her, caught hold of her clothes and dragged her towards him – he was so strong! Frantically she tried to push him away, but his influence wrapped around her fingers and stilled their wiggling, as her heels scraped along the ground.
‘Rostigan!’ she cried.
Rostigan stepped forward, sword drawn, one hand raised for threading.
‘No you don’t,’ Forger said, manoeuvring her swiftly between them. She found herself staring into Rostigan’s worried eyes.
‘Let her go,’ he said.
‘Gladly.’
Suddenly Yalenna was whistling upwards, the world growing rapidly brighter. Her arm thwacked painfully against stone and she spun, to land in a disoriented heap. Pushing herself up, she blinked around her.
She had been flung onto the roof.
‘Yalenna!’
Blearily she saw Salarkis, as the mortal man she remembered, and almost gave him a smile … but it dropped away from the corners of her mouth as her eyes turned upwards.
The Wound pulsed, and she gasped as she was seized in its power.
Forger’s influence came at Rostigan like a hundred winding snakes, which whipped around his sword arm to tie themselves in knots.
‘Why did you do it, Karrak?’
Rostigan grunted, trying to shake free.
‘Tell me what really happened to you,’ said Forger. ‘Where did you really go for all that time?’
‘You … wouldn’t understand.’
‘Come, at least try to explain.’
‘I had a moment of Regret.’
Forger scowled. ‘So what? So did I. Do you know what I saw? That I would devote my life to restoring my people, who we have just wiped from the face of Aorn. That I would get back my mummy and daddy,’ he was spitting now, he was so angry, ‘and my little sis … oh, but I loved her the most, I think. Yet instead of saving her, I left her trapped in grey flesh, while I gallivanted about doing whatever I pleased. The most I’ve seen of her since? Perhaps some likeness, unrecognised at the time, in the face of a distant descendent, who I happened to be slaying.’
Rostigan broke Forger’s grip for an instant, and was wrapped again more tightly than before.
‘I’m sorry,’ Rostigan said.
‘Sorry? Ha, at least you make me laugh. There’s nothing to be sorry about, my dear. Do you know why?’
‘You’ll tell me, I suppose.’
‘Because it didn’t change me! I don’t care, you see? I didn’t let some momentary imagining turn me into a piteous, blubbering mess!’
Forger pushed and Rostigan slammed against the wall. He slid to the floor, wondering how he had managed to avoid cracking his skull. Forger was too strong. That was the whole reason for trying to trick him onto the roof of his own accord. How miserably the plan had failed.
Rostigan became aware of a crumbling sound and looked up at the porthole window. Cracks ran out from it in all directions, bits of stone coming loose as it grew larger. He shoved off the wall moments before it fell away entirely, the whole side of the room opening up to daylight.
Forger moved past Rostigan to the edge. He gave a satisfied sigh as he took in the view, nostrils flaring as he breathed deeply. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘is it not a sweet thing, to taste such fresh air? Is life not full of innumerable pleasures? So wonderful, isn’t it Karrak?’
Rostigan wondered if he dared try to rise. ‘Come to the roof with me then,’ he said. ‘Forger, I beg you to consider it. No matter what you currently believe, once you have rid yourself of the Spell’s threads, you will thank me for bringing you to this place.’
Forger got a faraway look. ‘I imagine you are right,’ he said sadly. ‘But you aren’t going to talk your way out of this one, old friend. Such a silver tongue you have, I always thought, for one so seldom used! Is that how you keep it so shiny?’
He stooped to grab Rostigan’s cheeks, forcing them together to squeeze open his mouth and inspect his tongue. Rostigan was surprised by the motion, but not so surprised that he didn’t immediately lunge with his sword, which rasped from the ground to sink into Forger’s arm. Forger leapt backwards with an annoyed wince, cradling his injury.
‘You beg me?’ he said, disbelievingly. ‘Beg? Storm and ash, such a word to fall from Karrak’s lips. I don’t even
know who you are anymore.’
‘So what will you do? Kill me, take my threads?’
Forger gestured with his dripping arm and Rostigan slid towards the gaping wall.
‘I don’t care,’ said Forger, ‘the tiniest bit about your threads. I just care that you die.’
His muscles tensed, poised to send Rostigan over the edge.
‘Wait!’ Rostigan yelled.
Forger paused. ‘Yes?’
Fly fast, my friends! Fly fast and help me now, and I will never call on you again! You will be free, as once you were!
A flock of them down at the pit, picking stringy meat from dead Unwoven, hearkened to his call. It was not so far away, as the crow flew.
‘What is it?’ Forger demanded impatiently.
‘Let me go to the roof, at least,’ said Rostigan. ‘Lessen the corruption while there is this chance, so you may rule the world for longer. You know that you can kill me easily, and Yalenna, once we are our old selves.’
Forger frowned. Then, slowly, he unspooled his grip.
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘The heat waves you cause before my eyes have made me short-sighted. On your feet then. Get up those stairs.’
Rostigan nodded and planted the tip of his sword on the ground as a prop to help himself up.
‘And leave that sword where it is,’ added Forger.
Rostigan stared at him darkly, but nodded. As he got to his feet, he made as if to drop the sword.
A shadow scythed in through the open wall and smashed into Forger’s face. The bird’s beak sunk so deeply into his eye that it was momentarily trapped, and immediately went into a frenzy, scratching its claws and beating its wings. Forger roared and staggered backwards, seizing the creature to wrench it free. He blinked rapidly, one socket an empty hole framed by black-feathered lashes, the other containing enough hate for both. As he focused on Rostigan charging, his hands went up too late – a great swipe of the blade sent one of them spinning away, to bounce wetly across the floor. More crows swooped in, flying against Forger, and he retreated under the onslaught until he was stopped by the opposite wall.
‘Enough!’ he roared, and a series of popping noises filled the air as bones broke simultaneously in multiple birds. A shockwave blasted forth, sending those that followed spinning out of the tower.
Rostigan sent out his influence, and Forger returned with his own – where the two met, they deflected each other to fall away, cascades of power showering to the floor.
‘Your hurts find you weakened,’ Rostigan grunted, though the effort of keeping Forger at bay was still very great. ‘And you have erected a shimmer, I sense, to stop my birds finding their way in.’
‘I … will … rip … your …’
‘I could perhaps tear it down, but I am thankful for the way it divides your concentration.’
Angry as he was, Forger managed to look a bit uncertain.
‘I realise,’ said Rostigan, ‘it’s quite a choice. Take your chances with the crows, or maintain the shimmer and face me with lessened strength?’
Footsteps sounded from the stairs to the roof, and in his periphery Rostigan saw a figure emerge. A new stream of influence leapt at Forger.
‘Look at you, Salarkis,’ Forger said through gritted teeth. ‘So … soft …’
‘I think not,’ said Salarkis.
Rostigan knew that his new ally was not half as strong as either one of them. He had to push hard to keep Forger contained, lest his influence ripple out to the side and burst Salarkis’s heart. For some reason, he felt a moment of gladness that protecting the man had become a priority.
‘Get off!’ shouted Forger, sweat beading his brow. Out of habit he gestured with his severed stump, as if there was still a hand there to weave at the air. Rostigan wondered if his eyes were playing tricks on him – when they had first arrived in the room, Forger had needed to stoop under the roof, but now he stood with clear space above his head.
He was getting smaller.
‘You were foolish to come here,’ said Rostigan, ‘if you knew I would betray you. You have been too long without causing pain, and look how it has shrivelled you.’
‘It’s not fair!’ screamed Forger.
Now Rostigan could almost see it – as Forger continued to expel power, he was shrinking in size.
There came the sound of movement on the stair-well below.
‘Stay back!’ called Rostigan. ‘All but the threaders!’
‘I can’t spare them both from guarding Mergan!’ answered Jandryn’s voice.
‘Send one then, you fool!’
Moments later a white robed threader bounded up the stairs to join them. Her influence was the meekest of them all, and immediately Forger managed to snake a stray tendril along the floor which Rostigan could not stop. It whipped up into the threader to explode her brain, her eyes turned bloodshot as she toppled. The slight victory gave Forger hope, and he redoubled his efforts to reach Salarkis.
‘Watch out!’ Rostigan called, as rivers of threads twined against each other. He successfully contained Forger once again, and was startled to realise he was actually gaining ground.
‘Shall I aid you, Skullrender?’ came Jandryn’s voice.
‘Stay back!’
He could not risk Jandryn – out of any of them, Yalenna deserved her happiness. If he could just get Forger in hand himself …
‘I think I’m able to bring your shimmer down,’ he said. ‘There’s quite a few birds out there now, eager for a peckin’.’
‘No! No!’ Forger blinked his remaining eye furiously. ‘You can’t do that!’
With a quick swipe over his shoulder, Rostigan tore the shimmer apart. Outside the cloud of crows wheeled about to stream towards the revealed opening. As the first of them flew in, Forger managed to divert a few small strands to break them in the air, but others dodged the falling bodies. Forger could not hold them all back, as well as fight Rostigan and Salarkis, and he knew it.
Just like that, time stopped.
As all threading ceased, the release of pressure sent Forger pitching forward. He landed on his knees, head slumping to his chest. He was shorter than Rostigan now, by just a little.
About them, crows hung in the air, their beaks murderously open, eyes gleaming wickedly. Salarkis was frozen too, his hands poised to continue fighting.
‘You are spent?’ said Rostigan.
Forger groaned. ‘Curse you.’
He raised his head to glower tiredly, his empty eye somehow seeming more accusing than the other. His body was coated in sweat, running down to mingle with the blood from his weeping stump. His patchwork of leather sagged around him, stretched too big for him now. He was still muscular, under it all – a muscular, normal-sized man.
Rostigan cut a strip of cloth from his trouser leg and tossed it over. ‘Bind yourself.’
Forger stared at the offering.
‘Bind yourself,’ said Rostigan, ‘if you want to live. After you give back your gifts, you will no longer heal so easily.’
Forger howled at him, long and hard.
Rostigan waited.
Finally Forger was reduced to coughing, and Rostigan waited for that too.
‘You have a choice,’ he said presently. ‘I can kill you and take your threads myself. Ido not want that, but you cannot be allowed to keep them. Or you can walk yourself up to the roof.’
Forger hissed.
‘Yes, you will turn into someone else,’ said Rostigan, ‘but at least you’ll still exist. Isn’t that something? He – you – will be glad he is not you anymore. And, once it is done –’
‘Once it is done,’ shouted Forger, ‘I will be full of woe for the rest of my life!’
Rostigan raised the sword to Forger’s breast. ‘Choose.’
For a long moment Forger looked away. Then he felt for the strip of cloth and tried to wind it around his wrist. With only one hand to tie it, he didn’t have much luck.
Rostigan slid his sword into place across h
is back. ‘Let me help you,’ he said, going down on his knee.
Forger did not resist, only grimaced a little as Rostigan pulled the bandage tight.
‘On your feet,’ said Rostigan, rising.
Shakily, Forger got to his feet, carefully avoiding the crows frozen mid-flight. ‘What about these,’ he said. ‘Will they come for me when I unstop time, while the Wound rises me up, helpless in the air?’
‘I will call them off.’
A tear rolled down Forger’s cheek, mirroring the blood from his empty eye.
‘I only wanted to have a little fun, you know.’
‘I know.’
‘Didn’t you also? You did some terrible things in Ander, trying to make me believe in you.’
‘I did not enjoy that. It was just to get you here.’
‘Curse you,’ Forger breathed, without much feeling. Haltingly he turned and went towards the stairs. At the doorway he paused, his back still turned.
‘You’re going to do it too though, yes? Give back everything to the Wound?’
‘That was always the plan.’
Forger nodded.
‘See you soon then, brother.’
Slowly he walked up the stairs and disappeared from view.
Rostigan stood waiting. A while passed, but Forger had nowhere else to go. He would start time soon enough, and then Rostigan … he glanced around … Rostigan would be in a tower full of confused crows, whose quarry, as far as they could tell, had simply disappeared. He turned to the missing wall and blanched to see how many more were hovering just outside.
I should really get down, he thought.
Sound rushed back all at once, the room full of cawing, frenzied crows. Rostigan dove to the hard stone as the beats of wings peppered his back. Somewhere in the feathered cloud, Salarkis cried out in panic.
‘Get down!’ Rostigan shouted.
Begone! Begone! You are free to be lordless, free for all time!
The birds squawked and circled, battering each other, striking against walls. A few slipped down the stairs where Jandryn waited with Mergan, to be met by sounds of alarm.
Out! Out! Back the way you came!
Crows who were able began to turn about and spill from the opening. Others were stunned, and waddled along the floor giving low squawks. They collected at the edge, fluffing themselves up, until they had recovered sufficiently to launch. As the room emptied Rostigan checked on Salarkis, who was lying prone nearby, a little scratched but mostly intact.