Bone, Fog, Ash & Star

by Catherine Egan

  “Don’t leave me without my dose!” wept Malferio as the floor closed up again.

  ~~~

  Swarn, Uri, and Ely-Hathana stood on the hill looking down on the dark island.

  “The Thanatosi may not be susceptible to Magic affecting the senses,” said Swarn. She was not satisfied with the spell they had worked, which was supposed to refract the essence of a being so that seeking spells and enchanted objects such as the Vindensphere could not locate them. “Nobody knows how they find their prey. It may not be the essence at all that draws them, but some other kind of knowing.”

  “Well, if it doesn’t work, there are the barriers we raised around the house,” said Uri cheerfully.

  “I do not have great faith in our barriers,” Swarn answered. “We would need a Mancer to keep them up for long.”

  “They won’t manage a sneak attack with the barriers up,” said Uri. “And remember, we have two Storm Seamstresses here! They can bring a typhoon down on the Thanatosi, a gale that will sweep them away. No doubt you have a few tricks up your sleeve as well.” He eyed her shrewdly.

  “You should rest,” said Ely-Hathana, laying a hand on Swarn’s arm. Swarn wanted to shake off the friendly touch, but resisted the urge. There was no point offending her hosts. They meant well.

  “I will keep watch,” said Swarn.

  The wizard and the Storm Seamstress returned to the house, arm in arm, and Swarn remained on the hill. It was a beautiful island, but she was uncomfortable with beauty. She missed the barren marsh.

  The marsh was a mass grave now, her dragons buried in the swampy ground. After the battle with Nia that had nearly killed her, she had rebuilt her house high on the cliffs, the Irahok mountains hanging over her threateningly, and she relearned what it was to be lonely. She felt she had come to the natural end of a confused and arid life. But she did not die. She lived, wounded, weaker, with only two dragons remaining. The emptiness ahead yawned open every morning when she woke from her dreamless sleep.

  Swarn was born with the fight in her. As a young witch, she found relief only in battle. She could not bear to be still. She could not bear company. Her power was a tumult in her veins, a storm that had to be released, one way or another. When facing a dangerous opponent, the restlessness and rage that chafed her unforgivingly in her ordinary life fell away. It all narrowed down to the fight, only the fight. She did not fear death. She did not fear anything. That steely stillness at her core was the closest she came to knowing peace, and victory, every time victory, the closest she came to joy.

  The dragons of the cliffs of Batt were the most beautiful creatures she had ever encountered, and the most deadly. In her first battle with a dragon, she brushed up against death and discovered her will to live. She wanted to live! It seemed a revelation. The dragon was wild and vicious and full of magic – like her. She stretched her power to its very limits to defeat the dragon, and for the first time she felt real kinship with another creature.

  Swarn did not give the notorious Sorceress Nia much thought until Nia murdered Swarn’s sister, Audra. Swarn and Audra had never been close, but they understood each other, and there was something in that. She wanted to go and fight Nia – a great battle such as those she had known in the past. But together Malferio and the Oracle persuaded her that this was useless. Nia was Immortal and possessed the power of Illusion. She was far more powerful than Swarn and would surely defeat her. They could not kill her, but together they could banish her.

  Taken aback by her own grief and rage, Swarn accepted the proposal. She took her sister’s place in the Triumvira, and so Nia was banished. Swarn returned to the marsh with a sense of failure and a deep loneliness weighing on her heart. Who was she, if not a warrior? Who knew her, now Audra was gone?

  One day there was a terrible battle on the cliffs. A witch and a dragon, she heard. When she arrived, the dragon was already bowed in submission. A young woman of no more than fifteen or sixteen years old stood before the creature, her pale face flushed with triumph. She wore a black tunic and her long red hair hung in a thick plait down her back. She bore no weapon but a white staff.

  “I’ve heard of you,” said the girl, speaking the Language of First Days. “My name is Rea. I want you to teach me.”

  Swarn refused, but Rea was not to be put off. She claimed to be the Shang Sorceress, ward of the Mancers. She had sought Swarn out in secret to learn the secrets of combat and potions. Intrigued, flattered, disarmed, at last Swarn agreed to take her on as a pupil. It was immediately apparent that the girl was brilliant, far more powerful and intelligent than anyone Swarn had ever encountered. She lacked only experience.

  They talked more than Swarn had ever talked, but it was not idle conversation. Every word had weight, meant something, and Rea knew how to be silent too. It was companionship of a kind Swarn had never known. She liked to cook with Rea and hear her tell of Di Shang. They learned each other’s languages. Swarn felt her world expand with an entire new vocabulary. Soon she found herself missing Rea when she was gone, looking forward to her return.

  Yes, it was fair to say that she had loved Rea. Perhaps she had never loved anyone else but Rea, in her long life. Eliza had invited her to come to Di Shang and visit her mother but Swarn did not, could not. Perhaps Rom was content with what little remained of his wife, perhaps the mere reminder of the woman she had been was enough for him, but not for Swarn. The Rea she loved had been crushed, and that was the end of it. She developed a fondness for her daughter, a sense of responsibility, but Eliza was not nearly so gifted, nor so pure in heart and thought and deed. She was a confused, emotional child, overburdened with her power, out of place in the worlds. Swarn felt a kind of warmth and a kind of pity for her, but her tired old heart could not bear to love again.

  The loss of Rea left her bitter, brittle; Nia’s slaughter of the dragons broke something in her. Their beauty had been what bound her to the world; now they were gone. She went to face Nia to die and Eliza saved her, saved her life. Swarn returned to the marsh with the last of the cliff dragons, but she was changed. She had become old. Swarn thought she was waiting to die, but now, in Lil, she realized it was not death she was waiting for. It was something else whose time had come around.

  She had survived all these years in order to perform a greater task. Not to die in a vengeful battle. If there was such a thing as destiny, her destiny was beckoning. She felt it. And if nothing was preordained, then her own free will tugged her in one clear and obvious direction. She had waited too long, stayed too still. Now it was time to act.

  Her train of thought was shattered by a high scream coming from the house. She drew her knife from her belt and placed it between her teeth as she ran across the lawn, climbed swiftly up the outside wall, and hurled herself through the window, rolling across the floor and back to her feet in a shower of glass, the knife in her hand now.

  Gautelen screamed a Curse at Swarn, but it was clumsy and half-formed, easily brushed aside. She was on top of Eliza’s friend, a blade in her hand. Nell was holding her wrists, struggling and screaming.

  Charlie burst through the door and Gautelen swung Nell in front of her, holding the blade to her throat now and facing the other two.

  “No Magic!” she cried. “If I hear a spell I will cut her throat before you finish!”

  “Wait,” Swarn commanded her. “Do not be foolish. I will show you something to change your mind.”

  “Don’t!” cried Gautelen. Her eyes were panicked and the hand that held the knife was trembling. Nell was staring straight at Charlie, who looked from her to Swarn with a desperate, pleading expression.

  “Do you see this?” Swarn pulled something white and oblong, like a small flute, from her belt and showed it to Gautelen.

  “Stop it!” cried Gautelen, pressing the knife to Nell’s throat. “Put it away!”

  Nell and Charlie recognized the object, for Swarn had given Eliza one just like it. The poor girl, thought Swarn – she was so young, she had never hurt a
nybody before – she hardly knew how. Before any of them could move or speak, Swarn had the object at her lips and blew softly. A dart struck Gautelen in the neck and she fell to the ground, paralyzed.

  Nell ran straight into Charlie’s arms and he held her tight. They were both shaking. Uri mon Lil appeared at the door moments later.

  “What has happened?” he cried, running to Gautelen.

  “I can only assume she took Nell for the Shang Sorceress,” said Swarn. “She is paralyzed. It will wear off in a few hours.”

  Ely-Hathana followed in an elaborate white nightdress and looked murder at Swarn. Uri mon Lil stood hastily between them.

  “We will get Gautelen to her room,” he said.

  ~~~

  They spent the rest of the night in the visitor’s parlour, sipping hot tea made from wildflowers native to Lil. Nell was not inclined to feel particularly charitable towards the young woman who had held a knife to her throat, hoping to murder Eliza. She wanted to ask what in the worlds was the matter with Gautelen but she held her tongue, looking from Uri mon Lil pacing back and forth with his crinkled brow to Ely-Hathana hanging onto the arms of her chair as if she thought she might fall out of it. Swarn stood straight-backed and expressionless by the door. Charlie nodded off on the sofa, the teacup tipping out of his hands. Nell gasped, but before the cup spilled it righted itself and flew across the room to the table. She supposed there was not much danger of spills or accidents in such company.

  “What?” Charlie mumbled, waking up at her gasp.

  “Nothing.” Nell smiled at him in spite of herself.

  He looked at Uri and Ely-Hathana, rubbed a hand across his face, and said: “I spec it must be hard for you to understand why she’s acting this way.”

  Ely-Hathana gave him a poisonous look and said nothing.

  “What do you mean?” asked Uri mon Lil.

  “I mean, lah, I dinnay think either of you have ever met Nia, have you?” said Charlie.

  “I saw her, in her final battle with the Shang Sorceress,” said Uri. “But we were not, ah, formally introduced, so I suppose I cannot say I have met her.”

  “I have not met her,” said Ely-Hathana. “But she has enchanted my child somehow.”

  “Nay enchanted, exactly,” said Charlie. “A long time ago Nia freed me, too, from a different kind of bondage. I thought I was going to be trapped for all eternity with no free will…” He glanced uneasily at Swarn, who showed no sign that she was listening. She knew his history with her sister Audra, and with Nia. “And then Nia gave my freedom back to me. When she’s on your side, she’s really prize charming. I served her for a long time, willingly, because she was the face of my salvation. I did some terrible things on her behalf, aye, the worst of them being that I almost got Eliza killed. So I can understand a little what your daughter is going through.”

  Nell could not keep quiet any longer. “I’m so glad you’re able to sympathize with someone who had a knife to my throat an hour ago,” she snapped.

  “She didnay know who you were,” said Charlie. “She doesnay even really know who Eliza is. She thought you were some kind of all-powerful Sorceress and that she was doing something really dangerous and brave to help Nia. Before I met you, when it was Nia against the Triumvira and Nia against the Mancers, it was easy to see her as a victim, lah, up against impossible odds. It was easy to take her side. It wasnay until she was gunning for Eliza that I started to see things differently.”

  “So you think there is hope for her? That she will come to see the truth of the matter?” said Uri eagerly.

  Charlie shrugged uncomfortably. “Prolly. Eventually. Of course, I served Nia for about sixty years before changing sides, so it could take a while.”

  Uri’s face fell. At the same moment, the water-apes set up a baleful howl around the island. Ely-Hathana rose and pulled aside the curtain, looking out.

  “I cannot see,” she said. “The night is too misty.”

  “Oh no!” Nell leaped to her feet and ran to the window. The mist was creeping up the hill.

  “The barriers,” said Uri, confused. “They have fallen.”

  “The Thanatosi could not have done it so quickly,” said Swarn, feeling it too. “There is another power on this island. A great master of the art of barriers, I’ll wager.” She said this between gritted teeth.

  “Away from the windows,” said Ely-Hathana as the mist surrounded the house. “There is a secret passage in the basement, it travels under the island…” but she did not finish her sentence. The large windows shattered. White shapes with flying limbs and swinging blades came through them in a rain of arrows. Nell pushed Charlie down behind the broad cushioned settee, throwing herself over him to protect him. One of the Thanatosi, hair flying, leaped onto the back of the settee and swung his great shining sword down towards them. Then something came between them and the sword, deflecting the blow. Swarn swung and thrust a double-headed spear, placing herself before the settee and fighting off all comers.

  “Get up!” she cried to Charlie and Nell. “We must go!”

  They scrambled to their feet. Swarn tossed a handful of powder into the air. Everything went suddenly very black and still. Nell and Charlie each felt a hand close over their wrists, felt themselves pulled through the thick, heavy darkness, their thoughts swimming slowly: Something is happening, but I dinnay know what. I dinnay remember. By the time the potion wore off they were on the hillside, the Thanatosi coming after them, struggling out of the potion’s hold. Swarn threw her head back and screamed, a raw and terrible sound. Out of the jungle surged the dragon. It breathed green fire into the mob of Thanatosi. Swarn, Charlie and Nell leaped onto the dragon’s scaled back and it took off into the air. They left Lil behind them as the Thanatosi streamed down the hill towards the water.

  ~~~

  For a time, Gautelen’s mind was frozen. When it began to thaw and stir, she was in her own bedroom, on the bed, the door and window enchanted shut. She wiggled her fingers slowly. They hurt. Everything hurt as it came back to life, the poison within her dissipating. She sat up, nearly weeping with the agony of it. A grinding anger was working deep within her too. Her parents had betrayed her. They were playing host to Nia’s enemies and had allowed a witch to harm her. She crawled from the bed to the floor to the door, and laid her hands flat against it. Strong enchantments. She knelt there and whispered spells to break the lock, but she was too weak still and collapsed, trembling, on the floor. Through a haze of tears, she saw a door appear in the wall where there had been no door before. The door opened and a shining being stepped through, all white and gold. She sat up again, pulling herself back against the wall.

  “I know what you are,” she said helplessly, her voice thick and slow in her mouth. “I have read about you. You are a Mancer.”

  “I am,” agreed Kyreth. He went to the window and looked out at the night. “The Thanatosi are coming,” he murmured, and glanced at Gautelen over his shoulder with a faint smile. “They have a task I would like to see finished.”

  Gautelen trembled. He had eyes like twin suns and a voice like a tolling bell. She did not know what he was talking about, but she knew Mancers were the Sorceress Nia’s great enemies. The water-apes began to howl.

  “Oh, you are wrong there,” said Kyreth. He showed no sign of hearing the water-apes. “It is true that we were long at war with Nia, but some of us had reason to oppose the war. You see, I am her father.”

  “I don’t believe you,” whispered Gautelen. “Did my parents send for you? The Mancers are the guardians of the Shang Sorceress.”

  “Again, you are misinformed. Surely you have heard that the Shang Sorceress broke all ties with us? But that is not important. Your parents have no idea that I am here. I would not be welcome in the least. I am not here to discuss Sorceresses, Gautelen. They do not concern me now. I am concerned, rather, with a task that Nia left unfinished. I cannot finish it myself and so I need your help.”

  “What task?”

&n
bsp; “Ending the life of Malferio, former King of the Faeries.”

  She drew in a sharp breath and tried to get to her feet. Her knees gave out beneath her and she sprawled at Kyreth’s feet. He knelt swiftly.

  “The Warrior Witch has served you a dose of her poison,” he said. “We will see to that. Let me help you.”

  She felt his strong arms lift her up.

  “I need you to be willing, Gautelen,” he said. “Will you come to Di Shang with me? The Magic to end Malferio’s life is prepared but I cannot administer the killing blow. Will you do it?”

  “Gladly,” she replied.

  “Good. Look,” he carried her to the window. She saw a mist swarming up the hill and around the house. There were white figures in the mist, leaping and spinning.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “They will not harm your parents,” he replied. The windows downstairs shattered. “Now we must go.”

  He took her out through the new door. Doors appeared wherever he seemed to wish them. In no time he was striding through the jungle, alive with night sounds, carrying her like a child down to a sheltered cove where a dragon waited.

  ~~~

  Nell clung to Charlie, seated behind him on the dragon’s back. She imagined falling and falling through the early morning sky to the sea below. She had read somewhere that when falling from a great height the shock kills you before the impact, and wondered if it was true.

  “Where are we going?” Charlie shouted, for they had left all of Tian Xia behind them and the sea stretched to the horizon in every direction, a disc of green as far as the eye could see, ringed around with the fiery sky.

  Swarn looked over her shoulder at him and said: “Where none will follow us.”

  They flew throughout the day, high over the sea, descending occasionally for Swarn to spear fish, which the dragon roasted for them with a single breath. As the sun began to sink towards the horizon, the green sea was flecked with crimson and gold. The dragon began to descend.

  “Look!” Nell shouted, pointing.