Darkfall

by Isobelle Carmody

  ‘Maybe that is why she is here,’ Tareed said. ‘As proof of Lanalor’s veracity.’

  ‘There would be no time for her to prove anything. The instant she announced herself as a stranger she would be killed. And those who would overthrow Lanalor’s Charter are not the only danger,’ Alene pressed on grimly. ‘Others there are in this time who believe in Lanalor’s portal, but claim it leads to the Void of Chaos. They say any who come through it are demons.’

  ‘Why was I brought through this portal?’ Ember asked, thinking this was the most complicated dream she had ever had.

  ‘I do not know. No one knows why certain strangers come and not others, least of all the strangers themselves. The only thing they have in common is that they were all in the water at the time of remove. But many others are also in the water and they do not come here, therefore there must be some other element that causes them to be taken.’

  ‘Maybe it is just entirely random chance,’ Feyt said.

  ‘If I am a stranger,’ Ember said slowly, ‘why would you take me to this citadel where people will see me and want to kill me?’

  ‘I would be only too happy if we did not have to go there,’ Alene said. ‘But we must get you away from the isle of Ramidan and the only way off is by ship. To reach the harbour, we must pass through the citadel.’

  ‘Go by ship where?’ Ember asked.

  ‘Myrmidor,’ Tareed sighed wistfully.

  ‘Yes. To Myrmidor, and then to Darkfall. My sisters are agreed that this is the only course. You will be safe there from the demon-hunters,’ Alene assured Ember. ‘Now there is no more time for talk. We must eat and then we will leave. Song willing, we will find you a swift passage on a ship bound direct for Myrmidor.’

  ‘I don’t remember any portal,’ Ember said.

  ‘Why should you, when you have forgotten so much else?’ Tareed asked.

  Alene shook her head at Ember. ‘Still you tell yourself you dream. Very well. But if this is a dream, then it is a dream that can kill. Remember that and be careful.’

  The request was so earnest that Ember found herself nodding.

  ‘Good girl. Now you must get up. We will find something warmer and more useful than the garment you now wear.’

  Ember rose and stood passively as they removed the tattered sun dress and her underwear. Looking down, it struck her that she was very thin. Maybe she really was in a coma and would be until she woke, or until her memory returned. Possibly this whole fantastic scenario was her mind’s way of trying to wake her. If so, she need not concern herself about what happened in it. On the other hand, it was said that if you fell in a dream and did not wake before hitting the ground, you would die. That seemed to support Alene’s admonition that she think of this as a dream that could kill.

  Feyt slipped a long tunic over her head that ended at her ankles and wrists. It was soft and supple against her naked skin and wonderfully warm, despite its lightness. There was a tunic to go over the top, a long shawl for her shoulders, and flat sturdy boots that were several sizes too big. Tareed towelled her hair vigorously, then brushed it into a red cloud. When she turned Ember to her, she sucked in a breath of air.

  Feyt glanced over. ‘Song save us. The resemblance is incredible.’

  ‘Resemblance to whom?’ Ember asked, reaching up to touch her hair.

  ‘To an historical figure in our world,’ Alene said briskly. ‘That resemblance, like your half-blindness, is a complication we do not need right now.’ Her businesslike manner seemed to shake the other two out of their trances.

  ‘Her hair must be shaven as the Iridomi women shave their scalps. Or it could be sleeved,’ Feyt suggested.

  ‘We do not want any suggestion that she is Iridomi. Sleeved,’ Alene decided, to Ember’s relief. Dream or no dream, she did not want to be bald.

  ‘What about a veil as well?’ Tareed suggested. ‘That way no one in the palace would see her eye …’

  ‘A good idea, though we will not be visiting the cliff palace,’ Alene said.

  The amazons exchanged a glance.

  ‘Alene, you are Tarsin’s adviser,’ Feyt said carefully. ‘His chosen soulweaver. He will be furious if you travel to the citadel without going to the palace, and he is mad enough to throw you in the cells for it.’

  ‘Do not speak so of Tarsin,’ Alene said coolly. ‘He is your ruler and mine and, as such, he is to be obeyed in all things. You know as well as I do that he ordered me out of his sight when last I went to the palace. I am merely obeying him.’

  ‘You speak as if that was a rational command, and not the gibbering of a lackwit!’ Feyt snapped. ‘Tarsin is insane. He will expect you to come to the cliff palace regardless of what he said. You know that. Refuse and you will suffer for it.’

  ‘Then I will suffer,’ Alene’s voice was frigid.

  ‘Forgive me if I have offended you, soulweaver,’ Feyt said stiffly. ‘You know better than any of us what Tarsin is capable of, mad or no. But if you suffer, you will not suffer alone.’

  ‘It is said Tarsin’s madness came from a taint in his father’s blood,’ Tareed said.

  The older amazon rounded on her with a snort. ‘Do not be a fool. That is a rumour spread by Coralyn, for if the taint of madness did not come to Tarsin through Ranouf’s blood, who else’s could it have come from but her own?’

  ‘Be done, both of you,’ Alene said wearily. ‘I am soulweaver to Tarsin, as you have seen fit to remind me, and he is the Holder of Lanalor’s Charter, chosen by Darkfall Decree. Respect his title if you respect me, for I honour what Darkfall chooses. I will not go to the palace. What you say may be true, but I cannot take Ember there. It would be too much of a risk.’

  There was a strained pause during which Feyt managed to look both contrite and mutinous. Obviously she considered Alene more important than Ember. The packing was completed in silence by the two amazons and then they all ate a breakfast of porridge sweetened with stewed fruit. When they were finished, Feyt fetched a veil and draped the opaque cloth over Ember’s head, fixing it in place with a plaited leather circlet that fitted snugly around her forehead. The veil was very long and enveloped Ember to the waist, back and front, covering her hair which Tareed had already plaited and bandaged with long pieces of cloth.

  ‘I just hope we can get you onto a ship today …’ Feyt said worriedly, standing back to survey their handiwork.

  ‘Do not fuss,’ Alene said. ‘The veil will keep unfriendly eyes off her for the little time it will matter. We will be there and gone before half the citadel wakes to itself.’

  Tareed closed the door of the hut firmly behind them, and Alene turned back and seemed to cast a long last look about her. ‘I am sorry to leave this place,’ she murmured.

  They set off single file along the path around the lake, then took a branch that led them away from the sea. As they went deeper inland, the profusion of flowering creepers which grew parasitically around the tree trunks in a great tangle began to spread from one tree to another, producing in places the effect of a green wall running either side of the path. Neither the creeper, with its creamy clusters of blossom, nor the trees themselves, were the slightest bit familiar to Ember. She looked up to discover that the moonlight illuminating the path was cast by twin moons, one blue and near full, and one a greenish sickle in its last quarter. The dual moons meant everything had a twin shadow, one pale-green and the other blue.

  A dream, she told herself firmly.

  They walked right through the night, coming to a small clearing on the top of a hill not long after the green moon had set. The blue moon radiated enough light for Ember to see that Ramidan was quite a small island, the ocean being visible in two different directions. She could see no sign of human occupation in the dense wilderness which seemed to run from shore to shore, and said so. Tareed pointed to what appeared to be a jagged cliff on the very edge of the island. ‘That is the citadel. It’s hard to make out because it is built right on the stone cliff and is designed to follow
its line. That is just the edge of the settlement though. The citadel slopes all the way down to the water. Most everyone on this isle lives there because, officially, the rest of the island belongs to Tarsin. The palace is at the steepest end of the settlement, where there is a straight drop to the water.’

  ‘There are a couple of casting settlements further along the coast,’ Feyt said.

  Tareed grinned at her friend. ‘You ought to know.’ Then turning to Ember she explained, ‘Feyt was born to casters on Ramidan before she became a myrmidon.’

  Ember gazed up at the ghostly blue moon which was now near to setting, thinking such a moon in her world denoted almost impossible rarity. Onyx and Aden, Feyt had named the moons, but which was which? Puzzling over the complexity of detail in the dream, she tripped over a strand of creeper grown across the path.

  Tareed turned. ‘If you are tired, I can carry you. I am not as powerful as some of my sisters but I am myrmidon. And my rhiad was one of strength.’

  ‘Perhaps she is not so much tired of walking as of listening,’ Feyt said.

  Tareed looked crestfallen.

  Pitying her, Ember asked what a rhiad was.

  ‘It is the rite by which a woman proves herself worthy of becoming a myrmidon, protector to the soulweavers of Darkfall,’ Tareed said eagerly. ‘It was named after the first soulweaver to whom a myrmidon pledged faith …’

  She went on to relate a long and involved story of a warrior woman called Danae, who had befriended Rhiad, the daughter of Lanalor’s sister.

  ‘… the strength of their love for one another was legendary … Danae pledged to take no man to her bed, nor bear any children, so that nothing should hamper her in her love and care of Rhiad …’

  Ember let the words slide past her, thinking that sooner or later the dream must crack.

  When Tareed had finished her story, Feyt forbade her to tell any more. ‘You are no balladeer, girl!’

  Ember guessed Tareed must be about eighteen while Feyt was in her early thirties. Alene was older, though this showed more in her manner and expression than in wrinkles or greying hair.

  Ember stumbled again and the soulweaver stopped and turned to her. ‘You are still weak from your journey through the portal, Ember. The Scroll of Strangers observes that it is a draining experience. Feyt will find us a place to rest.’

  Ember nodded, forgetting that Alene was blind. It was curiously easy to do because the older woman did not behave as if she were sightless. How had she known, for instance, that Ember was the one who tripped?

  Feyt brought them to a clearing with a panoramic view of the citadel. By the time they reached it the Keltan sun had risen; half as large again as the earth’s, it had a ragged red corona. Tareed told her that the Keltan daystar was called Kalinda. ‘The Scroll of Strangers tells that you call your daystar Sol and that it is yellow. It also says you have one yellow moon, which you call Moon.’

  Feyt laughed. ‘Moon? That is like calling a tree, Tree.’

  Ember was staring past them in amazement, for the citadel was now clearly visible. Built on and seemingly into a rocky ridge rising up over the sea, the settlement was long and seemed to run for several kilometres at the visible edge. Given what Tareed had said about it, it was clear that the citadel was a thriving metropolis. The harbour was still hidden by the cliffs, but she could see the spires of the cliff palace and what might be the very top of some masts.

  Ember found herself wondering if she would awaken when they arrived. That sort of thing happened in dreams. You spent the whole time pursuing something and just when you were on the verge of achieving it, you would waken.

  Feyt pointed out the route that they would travel for the remainder of the journey. They would turn away from the settlement until they were down from the heights, she explained. Though it was not visible because of the trees, this course would bring them to a long thin plain which ran directly to the citadel, and which they could traverse more quickly than trekking through dense forest.

  Tareed spread out a blanket under an enormous tree and they sat down. The early-morning breeze was brisk and chilly, but Ember’s clothes were very warm. Only her nose and cheeks bore the brunt of the cold and she turned her face to the huge red Keltan sun to warm them.

  ‘You will wish Kalinda would hide its face once we are on the plainway,’ Tareed said. She rummaged in her pack and withdrew half a dark loaf. Using a knife from a belt sling, she carved it into thick slices.

  ‘I’m not hungry,’ Ember said.

  ‘You must eat now because this is the last chance we will have until we get to the citadel,’ Feyt said. ‘Out on the plainway it is not possible to eat.’

  Ember wondered why, but before she had formulated a query she was distracted by the sight of numerous intricate shapes all over the trunk of the enormous tree stretched above them. At first she thought they had been carved, but closer examination showed the markings were natural. She ran a finger over the wood, fascinated.

  ‘It is a veswood tree,’ Tareed volunteered. ‘I love the curves and twists in the trunk, but you should see how they grow on Vespi: absolutely straight with thick trunks and almost no branches, and the markings are quite different. On Fomhika they grow a lot more foliage, and the branches sprout right from ground level.’

  ‘Fomhika is a different island?’ Ember guessed. Tareed nodded. ‘And this tree grows differently there?’

  ‘Veswood trees grow differently on every island. Only on Vespi do they grow true, with hard oily wood that repels water and may be used for ships …’

  As she spoke the young amazon produced a stoppered jug of water from her pack. Ember was extremely thirsty and accepted a mug gratefully but, still full from breakfast, she had to force herself to eat a slice of the bread cake under Feyt’s stern eye. She watched in some awe as the two amazons demolished the remainder of the loaf. Alene only sipped at water and crumbled her bread to pieces without eating a morsel. When the meal was done, Feyt rose and stretched mightily, her muscles rippling.

  Ember’s heart jerked suddenly into a frantic rhythm and the world around her shuddered and shimmered as if through water or waves of heat. She got to her knees, meaning to stand up, but a savage jag of pain pushed her forward onto her hands and knees with a strangled cry.

  ‘What is it?’ Tareed asked in consternation, dropping her mug.

  Alene leaned forward and Ember felt cool fingers on her temples. The savage ache abated at once.

  ‘Pain …’ murmured the blind woman. ‘Ahhh!’ she screamed and recoiled.

  Immediately pain flooded back into Ember’s body.

  ‘What did she do to you?’ Feyt demanded of Alene. Ember looked up through a red mist of pain, and saw the amazon chaffing the older woman’s wrists.

  ‘Let me help you,’ Tareed said urgently, trying to draw Ember back onto her knees.

  Ember tried to answer, but agony ran through her head like liquid fire, strangling words, and she pitched forward into a whirling morass of cloudy darkness.

  She was a cinder on a roiling tide.

  All around her was a gibbering cacophony. The brutish hubbub hurt her ears.

  ‘This is not music!’ she screamed.

  ‘Music is harmony – it cannot exist here …’ A wild cackle of laughter followed the sibilant whisper.

  ‘Who … who are you?’ she whispered, frightened. ‘What are you …’ The voice had gone straight inside her mind as the manbeast’s had done. Only this speaker made no effort to temper it. Each time it spoke, a knife twisted behind her eyes.

  ‘I am Chaos and this is my domain.’ The words reverberated eerily in the drifting skeins of smoke.

  Ember noticed a glow and was drawn into it, leaving the rustling malevolent voice behind. She found herself peering in the window of a strange and lavishly decorated room. A woman wearing an elaborate golden head-dress was looking down at a short, stout man in red tights and a green silk tunic.

  ‘I am tired of this waiting,’ the woman sai
d. She reached forward suddenly and took the man’s chin in a cruel grip, lifting it so that he was forced to look up into her kingfisher-blue eyes. ‘I can do nothing while he lives.’

  ‘Shall I kill him for you, then?’ the man asked eagerly. Her grip forced his mouth open, baring teeth that were stained and crooked.

  The woman laughed and released him. ‘Soon.’ She began to pace back and forward. ‘First we must prepare the ground. I have in mind a likely scapegoat …’

  Ember opened her eyes. She was lying on her back looking up at leaves and, beyond them, at a sky so deeply blue it was nearer violet. Alene and the two myrmidons were bending over her with worried looks.

  ‘Thank the Song,’ Alene muttered.

  ‘I’m all right,’ Ember told them, struggling to sit. In fact, she felt surprisingly refreshed. ‘I guess it was the crossing, right?’

  None of the others spoke.

  ‘Is something the matter?’ Ember asked, puzzled.

  ‘Nothing is the matter except that we are losing time we cannot afford to waste,’ Alene said sharply, and rose to her feet. She staggered a little but waved Feyt away. ‘Let us get moving.’

  Soon they were making their way steeply down into the forest. The greenery had grown so dense now that in some places it linked overhead so that they were literally walking through a living tunnel. Ember felt no worse for her faint, though she was wondering how you could faint in a dream and be unconscious and then wake up in the same dream. She remembered reading somewhere once that if you dreamed in a dream, you were near to waking.

  ‘What is the Song you keep mentioning …?’ she asked, because she did not want to be left alone with questions that could not be answered.

  Alene responded solemnly, ‘It is the Song of Making. From it came all life in our world. Now, we have to get to the harbour before dark if you are to leave the citadel this day, so we must concentrate on walking fast. Wavespeakers will not begin a journey in darkness.’