Salvation's Fire

by Justina Robson

  His bunches of barsoon were all over the place. He went towards the cattle pens, searching, and was filled with doubt and a creeping sense of self-loathing as he found nothing. He went around the pen but the ground was churned with prints and it had been dry for days. Two more times he tried but wherever he’d once seen the eyes staring at him there was nothing to find and he knew in his heart she was gone. To his surprise this was worse than the prospect of him trying to return her to the refugees.

  By the time he returned to his stand the woman was on her feet, waving away the attentions of his aunt and leaning on his uncle’s arm. He went to clean up, doing his best to be ignored, but the dreaded touch on his arm and clearing of his uncle’s throat soon stopped him.

  “Well?”

  “She ran away,” Bukham said, pulling the basket that had held the bait off the plank it had been nailed to. “I looked all over, but I couldn’t find her. She’s gone.”

  “Who’s gone?” The woman who had fainted was standing there too. She had let go of Ghurbat’s arm now. Her accent was exotic, strange, he couldn’t place it among any of the many tribes and groups he had known. She had a way of speaking that was, in itself, peculiar—a very soft, almost gravelly tone that was absolutely clear to the ear in its meaning and articulation even though it seemed much quieter than the surroundings. He felt uneasy but since he’d nothing to know worth the knowing it seemed no matter to say,

  “Some girl that came from the Refugees. Stayed on, hiding out here. Now she’s gone.”

  “Ah, I see.”

  “You saw her?” Ghurbat asked, turning.

  “No, no, I was only curious,” the woman said. “It is late. I will go to my tent. Thank you for your kindness.”

  “Let me walk you there.” Ghurbat was at her side in a flash. He turned back to Bukham as an afterthought. “You can pick up Murti and go look for her in the morning. She can’t have got far. We have responsibilities, you know, to care for the lost. We are not animals.”

  Bukham stared after their backs, realising that this speech was really for her benefit and not his. After he had picked up and sorted the stock he packed a basket ready for the morning, counted the tally and found he couldn’t account for a set of ready-measured spices arranged in pretty little pouches which his cousin made. Where they had gone he’d no idea but he thought of the slow wink. Well, if she was a thief too she was Ghurbat’s problem now. Then he went to tell Tubayu the good news about her job for the morrow.

  “You should find her and bring her back here,” Tubayu said immediately, once she’d recovered from the notion that she had to debase herself by running the produce stand. “It’s not safe. This lot tell me there are bands of Yorughan making forays north, and other bandits.”

  “But we can’t keep her.” He knew he was repeating Ghurbat’s line, more to test it.

  “Of course we can,” Tubayu said. “Just one. She never stole anything other than food, did she? Well, then she’s not a natural thief. Only hungry.”

  “All right.” Bukham felt better, hearing his own feelings repeated in her words. She always had more conviction than he did and once he heard her he felt convinced too. “But first I have to find her.”

  “Murti can do it. Don’t take too long though. I have other things to do than stack canarops and swish flies. That’s for lesser beings.”

  Murti was in the main tent at Taib, where all visitors were housed. He was with another priest who had come lately down from the north and they were bent together in conversation, cross-legged on the carpets, a little brazier heating their tea and warming some flatcakes. Bukham didn’t want to interrupt them but as he entered the room Murti looked up and waved him over with an air of expectation and impatience.

  The priest was very old. His skin combined wrinkle markings and weather-wear into something that looked like worn-out boot hide and all that remained of his hair were a few tufts no longer in communication with each other across the bald dome of his head. Their white strands straggled down around his neck or stuck up like the down of a baby bird, directly into the air. His clothing was tough traveller’s wear, rougher by far than the pleasantly cut robe and trousers that Bukham had on, and in one glance he had more intensity than Bukham had possessed in his entire life. Bukham was scared of him. He approached, bowed, and sat down where he was directed.

  “This is Bukham, son of Oshmet,” Murti said to the other priest. “He’s just starting out.” He beamed confidently and with a kind of pride. Bukham was confused. He thought Murti must have got it wrong. He wasn’t going on a journey to start Wayfaring. He was going on a journey to get the girl and return her to the camp. That was all. It was only a journey. It wasn’t a Journey journey.

  “Wait. What? I’m not…” but Murti cut him off with a swift wave that turned into a flapping hand that meant he was to pipe down.

  “Ah, well, a good time to be moving,” the other priest said and Bukham was astounded to discover from the sound of the voice that the wizened husk of a thing, barely Oerni any more and certainly skinnier and more bent than any person should be who was still alive, was a woman. Or had been. Woman seemed the wrong word too. He felt a terrible flustering inside him as he suddenly doubted himself.

  “I’m Tillaray, good to meet you, priestling.” A hand like a curled rook’s claw thrust itself, dark and dusty, from the ragged clothing and made the sign of the Wanderer in a brief manner. Bukham felt amusement and a keen attention on him although Tillaray’s face was hidden in wrappings and scarves so that only two gleams like the glint of the moon on a steel blade were briefly visible. The oddness of the name struck him as very un-Oerni but he wasn’t about to ask.

  “Stifling your curiosity, boy,” Tillaray said. “Got to stop. How will you ever learn? On the road you have only yourself to answer to, hm? What’s this journey then?”

  “I uh… I’m not here to join the priesthood,” Bukham said, feeling it needed clearing up quickly before things got any more out of hand.

  “Ah,” Tillaray said. “I’m sure you think so, however mistaken you are. Pass my tea.”

  Bukham passed one tepid cup over and then looked at Murti for guidance. “I came to tell you that we don’t have to go anywhere. The girl. She’s gone. I’m going to look for her and then my sister’s going to take her in.”

  “Oh,” Murti said and scowled. He took up his own tea and tossed it straight in Bukham’s face. “Go get your clothes on and get ready to leave.” He muttered something about the youth of today under his breath.

  Bukham wasn’t entirely surprised, although he had started. Priests were notoriously short-tempered and prone to dramatic actions and he wasn’t hurt. He felt tea dripping off his nose. He mopped it up with his sleeve. But he did need to make it clear that there wasn’t going to be any Journey. “I…”

  “Stop talking. We’re going to lose her. Go get your things, you can’t walk all the way to the coast in those sandals. Your uncle said you’d be ready. What’s going on?”

  “But…” Bukham began, feeling himself digging in as the dampness of the tea started going cold on him. Why was the old man talking about the coast? What had that to with anything? “I am not a priest. My uncle has played an unkind trick on you. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “We’re leaving in an hour,” Murti said. “Moon’ll be up then, easy walking. Move your arse.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE GODS HAD never been something Celest gave much thought to, until the Kinslayer had raised his armies and set out bent on destroying the human world. Even then, up to and beyond the final battle at Nydarrow, she hadn’t cared to muse on their nature, their motives nor what monstrous reasons drove their descendants to madness. She figured that with immortality and massive power came meaningless drivel and stupid whimsy, leavened occasionally by a bit of focused goodwill or malice depending on what decade it was. At least that’s what was going on if the last centuries were anything to judge by. Plus there was Deffo, the Undefeated, who had spent th
e whole of the war disguised as a badger and who was now attempting to curry fame at any price. When he was one of your executors you really had serious problems.

  They were sitting at a wayside tavern over the Forinthi border, about twenty leagues from Celest’s home: she, Heno, Nedlam and Ralas, clutching the lute that Caradwyn had given him as if its travelling case were a baby. The journey so far had been met with storms which weren’t divine in origin but might as well have been since their winds and lashing rain had stopped them almost before they were begun. As a result of the weather the tavern was crowded, muggy and filthy. They got some of the last spaces in the second room which was without a fire but at least allowed Nedlam and Heno to have reason to keep their hoods up. Celest kept her sword ready even so; she knew there were few people outside Fernreame with the patience to figure that some Yorughan might not still be in the service of the Kinslayer and plenty who would hold back only out of fear for their own hides.

  She put her own hood back and shouted an order across the room to the server, then fixed the old man who had just taken a seat beside her with a strong glare. He had taken on an affable expression of harmless goodwill and genteel decrepitude, but it was all she could do to keep from strangling him. He was, however, their only contact.

  “Deffo, you’re sure you know where he’s going?”

  “Yeah, no, not as such. It was more a general direction and some hunches.” He cast her a sweetly helpless, apologetic glance, hand trembling on his staff. What a sweet old granddad.

  She scowled at him, water dripping off her hair, down her nose and onto the table top where she leaned over it. Her next words were carefully chosen to keep her rage in check and her purpose clear. She wasn’t about to scupper things for the sake of her temper. It could wait. “What did he actually say. Exactly?”

  “He said he had an idea what may have been done to cut off the gods and he was going to find out.”

  “Ye-es, we’ve done this bit back at Fernreame,” she said. She had a good idea that there wasn’t going to be any more and she was going to have to continue to hold herself back from killing Deffo for a good long time to come.

  Deffo leaned in and spoke sepulchrally to keep their conversation private. “Right, well, he said that there was a way to where they are, maybe, from one of the sacred rings and he thought the Unmentionable One must have used one of these to do what it was that he did.”

  “What rings?” Nedlam asked, scratching vigorously through her wet, spiky hair, knocking her hood back.

  “Those rings of stones that the Oerni priests built ages ago,” Deffo said. “You know, giant rocks, on end. Nobody knows how they lifted them. Set them up as marks to the Wayfarer; for Wanderer.”

  “Oerni very strong?” Nedlam suggested, easing herself onto the uncomfortable trestle in a new position. It creaked under the combined weight of her and Heno, who was sitting quite still.

  Celestaine saw a lot of heads, eyes and talk moving in their direction as the other travellers in the room realised they were looking at a couple of Yorughan. She looked up impatiently, hoping they could get to eat before the place erupted.

  “No, not particularly,” Deffo was saying. “Well-built and powerful, but not strong enough to carry things like that around. They’re part of Wanderer’s people though. He’s their patron, if you like. Or he’s like the top priest. I don’t really know how they think about it. But the rings and the avenues they marked up are all gateways that Wanderer uses to get to other places. There’s a whole travelling thing going on there.”

  Now Celestaine wished they weren’t having this conversation at all. “What other places?”

  “Places that only gods can go,” Deffo said, looking evasive. “I never used one myself. Not my style. I can’t say for sure.”

  “Places out of this world,” Heno suggested quietly. “But in another. That’s where the Kinslayer got many things from, including the Heart Takers’ power, and the Vathesk.”

  Celestaine shivered, thinking of the terrible crablike Vathesk and their insatiable hunger. They had been called to serve the Kinslayer’s war purpose and their starvation made them mindless; but everything they ate couldn’t dampen their hunger, because they could consume but not digest it. Creatures that were unable to die, suspended from their natural habitat: they were insane before she even met the first one or saw them clacking madly as they trampled through the battlefield, shearing and feeding until they were chopped into pieces. Then there were the circles. They were places she’d instinctively avoided, thinking it was better not to tread on someone else’s sacred ground without a good reason. Now the news that they were more than attempts at temples made her queasy. Things that could be fought hand to hand she was familiar with: things requiring magic, much less so. And divine guidance, well. She looked at Deffo. “And your plan is?”

  “We go check ’em out. One at a time.”

  “The nearest one’s at Hathel Vale,” Ralas said with a shudder.

  “Then that’s where we’re going,” Celestaine said as their food arrived and was dumped on the table as quickly as possible. Watery gravy and unidentifiable vegetable matter slopped onto the planks as the server retreated, his eyes on Heno as if he expected a fork to the face at any moment. “Let’s eat this and get moving.”

  “I’ll just smooth things over with a little rendition…” Ralas said, retrieving his lute from its case. He stood up and staggered around the table, wincing, until he was able to reach the front of it where he leaned in an extravant performance pose which hid most of the others from view behind him. The lute didn’t hold its tune in the damp, but he set up boldly, confident in his skill, and the room paid him attention.

  Celest wanted to stop him. His suffering was a constant fuel to her urge to mend things and it would never stop because Ralas could never heal, or die for that matter. Extra efforts that taxed him severely were all she could prevent. But she was hungry and Hathel Vale was a journey she didn’t plan to make any more comfort stops on. Against her better judgement she let him get on with it and begin ‘The Stones of Carrabree’, a traditional Forinthi favourite, which she hoped would buy them enough goodwill to get out with their legs intact.

  “Maybe travelling through worlds is how he obtained your sword,” Heno said, in response to the mention of the circles. Celestaine nodded, and immediately missed the sword itself. Then she looked up as Heno paused in his laborious chewing and fixed his gaze on the other side of the room.

  “Heno?” Nedlam followed the line of his gaze but her sight was blocked by Ralas.

  “Later,” Heno said, very quietly now so that he seemed to be less muttering than gnawing a bit of gristle. He put his head down to the dish as though it was all delicious and kept his face hidden.

  Nedlam scowled. She would have stood up but Ralas was in full swing and it would have thrown him off the table. Also the ceiling was too low and it would have achieved little beyond reminding everyone she was there. Celest peered at the part of the room Heno had scoured but saw only a tall woman in a worn great cloak stuffed into the corner as small as she could go. The feet of a pair of expensive boots stuck out from the ancient woollen hems, tooled with what once would have been gold and was now a few flakes stuck into some embossing. Her face was hidden by the corner’s edge. Her hands—dark and elegant—toyed with a breadcrust and a cup.

  Ralas launched into the chorus and a few voices joined in. So maybe it wasn’t the woman that had spooked Heno but something else, Celest thought. Maybe. She chewed her bread and crunched on a piece of grit, spat it out and felt her tooth with a finger. Still there. One thing that was going right.

  After they’d escaped the curiosity of the tavern intact they were riding north, Celestaine and Ralas on their mounts and Heno and Nedlam walking. The rain had abated and become a sullen mist, but the road here had been fortified during the occupation and the footing was fair as long as nobody considered what might have been used as aggregate to get such good drainage. Celest had g
limpsed more than one or two pieces of bone and the fragments of Cheriveni armour. Then Nedlam finally said, “So, Heno. What?”

  “That woman. Her boots.” He turned to Celest to explain, walking by her stirrup. Around his tusks his lips made the words slow and thoughtful. “The Kinslayer had a few lackeys who did odd jobs for him, things he didn’t want to do or couldn’t get to. They travelled, his couriers and his spies. They’re the fixers who stole objects of power and greased palms in the early days, before he’d really got into his stride and didn’t need any more help. I saw most of them dead before we left Nydarrow. He killed them early, when their existence was more trouble than it was worth. But some lasted the course. They were the closest things he had to advisors. She was one of them. I’d know those boots anywhere. I saw her outside his sanctum, near the door as we reached it, running away just before that last fight.” He meant before he and Nedlam had let in the assassins to kill him.

  Celestaine searched her memories of that moment but she only recalled Lathenry beside her—the last moments of his life before the Kinslayer ripped his heart from his chest. She took a breath. “Why would she be here, now?” She looked around for Deffo to start grilling him but he wasn’t in sight. She strained from the saddle, peering in all directions and then swore savagely. “Ah, as if I can’t guess what’s made him run off.”

  “Tricky,” Nedlam said with a huff. She was chewing on the knuckle of the meal’s one large bone as she strode along, hammer haft in one hand, the weapon resting on her shoulder, bone in the other hand. She seemed thoroughly content. “That’s her name.”

  “Where’d he go?” Ralas blinked, sure he hadn’t missed anyone until now. Deffo had been right there… where he now wasn’t.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Celest said. “Stick with the plan.”

  “I’m still not sure what we’re doing,” Ralas confessed, trying to wrap himself more comfortably in his cloak, wincing as he moved. His shaking fingers compulsively checked the lute case attached to his saddle.