‘Why do they live like this?’ he murmured.
‘To be close to the Lake,’ said Yolun. He stopped paddling, and for a moment his austere features glowed with fervour. ‘The Lake is Mother and Father to us. From it comes all life. To it all life must return.’ The resentment returned. ‘We don’t expect strangers to understand.’
‘I’m no stranger,’ said Renn. ‘I’m Open Forest, like you.’
‘You’re not Otter Clan!’ he snapped. ‘No more talk.’
Wreathed in greenish smoke, the camp of the Otters floated above the Lake, linked to land by a single narrow walkway.
‘It’s built on stilts,’ said Bale, amazed.
A forest of logs had been planted in the Lake, and on these lay wooden platforms bearing many squat reed domes. A bitter tang of smoke wafted towards them, with a powerful smell of fish. They saw smouldering brands mounted on posts; men and women gazing down at them, their eyes wide in their green-painted faces.
Renn was perplexed. The Otters were known as happy, playful people, like their clan-creature. Something had changed.
And all wore the green clay. Until now, Renn had never seen it, although she knew it was sacred to the Otters, who took it from a secret place on the north shore, and mixed it with fish oil. But they only ever used it to protect the sick and the dying. She wondered why the whole clan needed it now.
Yolun’s companion moored the craft to one of the outer piles, and a hatch opened overhead. A rope ladder dropped down, and Yolun ordered them to climb.
They emerged into an acrid haze. Renn saw that what she’d taken for brands were chunks of horsehoof mushroom – burnt, she guessed, to keep away midges. And still the Otters stared.
She and Bale were pushed towards the largest shelter: a smoky hut lit by rushlights. Inside, she was assailed by a stink of rotting fish. The Otters seemed unconcerned, and even Bale merely wrinkled his nose. Out of politeness, Renn pretended not to notice.
When everyone had crawled inside, Ananda called for food. Seeing Renn’s surprise, she said, ‘We have a saying on the Lake. A stranger is my guest until proven my enemy.’
Yolun snorted, as if he’d had proof enough.
‘We’re not enemies,’ said Bale.
‘So you say,’ said Ananda. ‘Eat.’
There was silence while a boy and a young woman brought fish-shaped bowls of tight-woven sedge filled with reed-pollen gruel, and a basket piled with baked reed stems: charred on the outside, white and starchy when peeled.
Renn recognized the young woman as a Raven who’d mated with an Otter the previous summer. ‘Dyrati?’
Dyrati avoided her eyes. ‘Eat,’ she said, ladling a grey sludge over Renn’s gruel. It looked like thick honey, but the stench of rotten fish made Renn’s eyes water.
‘Stickleback grease,’ said Dyrati. ‘Eat!’
‘Eat!’ commanded Yolun. ‘Or do you scorn our food?’
They were all watching her.
She prodded the stinking mess, and felt her gorge rise.
Bale came to her rescue. ‘She isn’t used to boats, it’s turned her stomach.’ Emptying her bowl into his, he started eating with every appearence of relish – and the Otters relaxed.
‘How can you?’ whispered Renn.
‘I like it,’ he mumbled with a shrug. ‘We make the same thing in the islands, but with cod.’
‘You’ll be wondering why we have no fish to give you,’ said Ananda. ‘Even this grease is from last spring.’ She searched their faces. ‘Someone is making the Lake sick.’
The Otters began rocking and moaning, and many touched the tufts of clan-creature fur hanging from their ears.
‘A while ago,’ Ananda went on, ‘a child fell ill, and our Mage sent us to fetch the sacred clay. We found the healing spring plundered. A stranger had stolen what only an Otter may touch. That’s when the troubles began.’ She shuddered. ‘People would fall into a death-like sleep and wake screaming, bitten by slithering demons in their dreams. Then the catch failed.’
Yolun shook his head. ‘There used to be times when the fish were so plentiful that you could step from your boat and run across their backs, all the way to the shore. But this spring – hardly any. And what we do take is twisted. Cursed.’
‘Every spring,’ said Ananda, ‘the ice river in the east sends much water to the Lake. It’s a time of great blessing, when the water rises so high that its voice beneath our shelters laps us to sleep. Not this spring. The Lake sinks lower and lower.’
‘Trouble always comes from the west!’ cried Yolun, fixing his red-rimmed eyes on the strangers. ‘We heard tell of an outcast, heading for the Lake. Then we saw him. He stole the sacred clay, he brought the troubles! And now these strangers have come to make it worse!’
At the mention of Torak, Renn and Bale stiffened. Neither dared meet the other’s glance.
The Leader was on it at once. ‘You know the outcast. Who are you?’
‘I’m Bale of the Seal Clan,’ Bale said proudly.
‘And I’m Renn of the Raven Clan. I’m Fin-Kedinn’s brother’s daughter. Dyrati knows me.’
Dyrati folded her arms and said not a word.
Renn showed them her wrist-guard. ‘See this? It’s greenstone. Fin-Kedinn made it for me in the Otter way, which he learnt when he lived with your clan.’
An old man lifted rheumy eyes from his bowl. ‘I remember. An angry young man, but he honoured the Lake.’
‘Even if the girl is who she says,’ said Yolun, ‘what of the boy? A Seal on the Lake? How can that be right?’
‘He has the waterskill,’ Renn said quickly. ‘And look at the reeds tattooed on his arms.’
Bale’s tattoos were of seaweed, but he had the sense to keep quiet.
‘None of this matters!’ exclaimed Yolun. ‘You all saw how they started when I mentioned the outcast!’
The Leader searched Bale’s face. ‘Do you know the outcast?’
Bale lifted his chin. ‘Yes. But that’s no crime.’
‘Helping him is,’ snarled Yolun.
Bale tensed.
‘You see that?’ cried Yolun. ‘They’re in league with him, that makes them outcast too! Ananda, we must kill them, or the troubles will get worse!’
‘No!’ protested Renn. ‘We have nothing to do with your troubles. But – but I do know who’s causing them.’
‘How can you know? Why are you here?’ Ananda leaned closer. She had strange, grey-green eyes which seemed to hold the light of the Lake.
Renn’s heart began to race. If she lied, the Leader would know it. If she admitted their purpose . . .
‘The evils you speak of,’ Renn said carefully, ‘the failed catch, the biting demons – these will spread to the Forest if they’re not stopped.’ She paused. ‘There’s a Soul-Eater on the Lake. That’s why this is happening. That’s why we’ve come.’
There was stillness in the shelter. The only sounds were the sputter of rushlights and the splash of water far below.
‘She’s lying,’ said Yolun. ‘A Soul-Eater? Where’s the proof?’
The Leader never took her eyes off Renn. ‘She speaks the truth,’ she said at last. ‘But not the whole truth.’ She gave a curt nod. ‘The Mage will uncover the rest.’
NINETEEN
‘Say nothing,’ Renn whispered to Bale as Yolun pushed them along a walkway wreathed in smoke.
Bale bent his head to hers. ‘You heard Ananda. Their Mage will find out the truth. How do we stop him?’
‘Keep your thoughts away from Torak,’ she replied. ‘Fix your mind on the strongest feeling you know. Anger. Hatred. Grief.’
He frowned. ‘Those are all bad.’
The smoke parted, and they found themselves on a round platform on which stood a small reed shelter. The doorway was edged with the teeth of an enormous pike. Above it swam an otter, beautifully carved in gleaming alder wood.
Yolun forced them to their knees, and Ananda motioned them to enter. Filled with misgiving, they crawled in
side.
Renn caught the dank smell of reeds; the splash and gurgle of the Lake. Through gaps in the floor, its restless glimmer rippled over the walls. She heard Bale’s sharp intake of breath. Then she saw why.
Two children sat cross-legged in the gloom. Their heads were bowed, their pale hair pooled on the floor. Both wore sleeveless tunics of silver fish-skin, sewn with strips of green-stained hide in a pattern of waving reeds.
Twins, thought Renn. Dread stole through her. First the twin fawns, then the two-headed fish. Now this. What did it mean?
Ananda and Yolun forced her and Bale lower, then touched their own foreheads to the floor. ‘Mage,’ they said.
As one, the twins raised their heads.
Their hair was the greenish gold of mildewed reeds, and their skin had the glistening pallor of the newly drowned. The boy’s eyes were bright with waterlight, but the girl’s were a misty, sightless white.
‘She sees the world of the spirit,’ said Yolun with reverence.
‘How can this be?’ said Bale. ‘They can’t be more than ten summers old.’
The boy’s lips drew back from pointed grey teeth. ‘Age has no meaning,’ he said in a thin, piping voice. ‘We are the spirit reborn. We are the Mage.’
Renn felt a shiver run down her spine.
‘We were here at the Beginning,’ said the boy. ‘We saw the Great Flood wash the land clean. We saw the Lake become.’
The blind girl moaned. The boy’s face tightened in distress. ‘But now evil dishonours the Lake! The terror comes in the night!’
Ananda spoke. ‘Mage, these strangers admit to knowing the outcast who took the sacred clay.’
‘The outcast didn’t take it,’ said the boy. ‘He caused it to be taken.’
‘But Mage,’ said Yolun, ‘it’s the same thing.’
‘No,’ said the boy.
‘Then tell us,’ said Ananda. ‘Why have they come? What should we do with them?’
The blind girl put her hand on her twin’s knee, and he nodded as if she’d spoken. ‘We will make them tell.’ He gave a sharp grey smile. ‘We will ride with the spirits on the voice of diver-bird and reed. We will draw out the truth.’ Then to Yolun, ‘Shut in the dark.’
Yolun untied a rolled-up mat, covering the doorway. Renn felt trapped. If these weird children discovered that they wanted to help Torak – if they really could see her thoughts . . .
In the gloom, she saw the boy take a pouch made from the skin of a whole salmon. From its jaws he drew a segment of reed, which he slit with his thumbnail. Softly he blew through the slit, and the shelter filled with the wavering cry of the diverbird.
Now the girl withdrew a long loop of twisted sedge and wove it between her fingers. Renn saw patterns form: a fishing net, a boat, a tiny Death Platform. Her thoughts began to unravel.
She shook herself awake.
‘Soft, soft,’ whispered the boy. ‘It comes.’
First they heard it, swooshing and gurgling into the shelter. Then they felt it: water swirling round their legs.
Renn gave a start. Bale shifted in alarm.
‘Don’t move,’ warned the boy.
Now Renn felt the slippery coldness of waterweed winding about her. She glanced down. The shelter was dry. And yet – she felt it: waterweed coiling about her legs, her waist, her arms. She struggled. She couldn’t move.
She could only watch as the blind girl reached both hands towards Bale. He tried to pull away, but the unseen waterweed held him fast.
The tips of the girl’s fingers were white and puckered, as if they’d been too long in the water. Like minnows they flickered over his face, tracing the line of his jaw, the muscles of his throat.
The blind girl opened her mouth, and her voice was as the rushing of waves drawing back over shingle. ‘Your brother is better now,’ she murmured. ‘Death healed his pain.’
Bale gasped.
The white fingers darted to the nape of his neck – and she drew back with a moan. ‘Ah! You must use your time well!’
She released him – and Bale bowed his head, breathing hard.
Renn braced herself as the blind girl turned to her. Shutting her eyes, Renn felt a fluttering on her face, soft and chill as the touch of a frog. She tried to turn her mind from Torak, but the thin fingers reached into her thoughts and pulled him to the surface, so that he was all she could think of.
She saw him not as she’d seen him last, huddled in the willow thicket, but on a day in spring when they’d been hunting. He was down on one knee, examining the bitten-off end of a hazel twig. His dark hair flopped in his eyes, and his face wore the rapt expression it always did when he was tracking. He caught her watching, and flashed one of his rare, wolfish grins.
The blind child reached for the image.
With all her strength, Renn thrust the memory down deep.
‘Ah,’ said the blind girl, ‘this one is strong!’
Her fingers flitted to Renn’s wrists, lingering on the zigzag tattoos. ‘A battle rages within her,’ she whispered. ‘She must take care, or it will tear her apart.’
Again an image of Torak rose in Renn’s mind, but this time he stood on a black shore, and his face was so savage that she hardly knew him.
Again the cold fingers groped for the image.
With a huge effort of will, Renn pushed Torak away and fixed her thoughts on the Viper Mage. She breathed on the spark of hatred which slept in her heart, and it flared into life: a hot, bright flame. She fixed her mind on that.
The blind child sighed.
Renn shuddered and opened her eyes.
Ananda spoke in hushed tones. ‘What of the outcast? Are they in league with him?’
‘No,’ murmured the blind girl. ‘But they are bound to him. He by the bone, she by the heart.’
Ananda frowned. ‘There’s no crime in that. We’ll have to send them back to the Forest.’
‘No!’ cried the twins together. ‘The Lake has need of them! The boy’s strength, the girl’s power! They are needed to fight the terror which comes in the night!’
The girl turned her misty eyes on Renn. ‘You know this terror. You have power to fight it, yet you’re afraid. Why? Why do you fear your power?’
Yolun stared at Renn. ‘Are you a Mage, too?’
She shook her head.
‘Tell. Tell,’ urged the twins.
For a third time, Renn felt the girl probing her thoughts, delving even deeper, seeking her most closely guarded secrets.
No! she screamed in her head. She fought, but the waterweed held her fast.
In desperation, she breathed life once again into that tiny flame of hatred. It brightened – engulfed the shelter in fire . . .
The blind girl cried out.
The boy fell back.
Renn felt the waterweed snap and slither away.
Wearily, the boy sat up. ‘They may pass freely. Give them clothes and food fit for the Lake and send them east.’
Yolun sprang to his feet. ‘No! This can’t be!’
‘But Mage!’ cried Ananda. ‘Are you sure?’
‘We see them travelling east,’ panted the boy. ‘East to the ice river. She will use her power. He will help her. They will find what they seek.’
‘No!’ protested Yolun.
‘Let them go,’ ordered the boy. ‘If they do wrong, the Lake will take them, and you will find their bones rolling in the Bay of Lost Things.’
Yolun looked thunderous; Ananda bewildered.
Trembling, Renn crawled for the mouth of the shelter. Suddenly, the blind girl seized her wrists. Renn tried to pull away, but the bony fingers were strong.
‘Beware the cold red fire,’ breathed the girl. ‘Beware the Lake that kills!’
Renn wrenched herself free and stumbled from the shelter.
TWENTY
‘Why are they letting us go?’ said Bale. ‘It’s too easy, I don’t like it.’
Renn didn’t answer. The encounter with the twins had left her drained,
and terrified of what they might have seen in her thoughts.
She and Bale were back in the main shelter, where Ananda had left them. Yolun peered in, and jerked his head at Bale. ‘Out,’ he growled. ‘I’m to give you supplies and Lake-worthy clothes.’
Renn made to follow, but he stopped her. ‘Not you! A woman will see to you!’
Renn soon discovered that Yolun wasn’t the only one who hated seeing them freed. When Dyrati brought her new clothes, she refused to meet her eyes, and dumped the clothes on the mat. ‘You won’t be needing your buckskins,’ she said sullenly. ‘Too heavy when wet, too stiff when dry. Put these on.’ She indicated a pair of calf-length leggings of soft elk hide and a sleeveless jerkin of finely woven sedge. ‘You’ll have to sew on your clan-creature feathers yourself.’
In uncomfortable silence, Renn changed her clothes and cut off her clan-creature feathers to sew on later. When she tried to thank Dyrati, the older girl made for the door.
‘Dyrati?’ said Renn. ‘What have I done?’
Dyrati’s mouth tightened. ‘As if you didn’t know. You might have fooled our Mage, but you can’t fool me.’
‘What do you mean?’
Dyrati turned on her and made the sign of the hand. ‘Stay away! I’ve told them what you are! I’ve told them what we used to whisper behind your back. You with your black, black eyes and your dreams that come true! You’re bad luck. Everyone knows it. Everyone knows that whoever gets close to you comes to harm!’
Renn felt sick. ‘That’s not true.’
‘You know it is! Your brother. Your father. Torak. Someone should warn that Seal boy before it’s too late!’ Then she was gone, leaving Renn on her own.
She was shaken. What if Dyrati was right?
Oh, nonsense! she told herself. Dyrati’s just a spiteful girl who’s never liked you.
The trouble was, nobody did like her much. They tolerated her because she was Fin-Kedinn’s bone kin, but they were scared of her talent for Magecraft.
Misery welled up inside her, and she longed for Torak. Only Torak had ever been her friend.
On the walkway she found Bale, who now wore elkhide leggings and a jerkin of silvery fish-skin. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked when he saw her face.
Chronicles of Ancient Darkness Page 71