Fleeting life - like men and women, as much as mayflies and waxwings - owe their tenuous purchase to little more than the denial of truth. It’s the outrageous belief that a frighteningly hostile universe should couch comfort and care, should lend love and latitude, even extend a hand of friendship and fruitfulness, that ultimately carves out a tenable place for such soft things in a very hard place.
Phaylan and Mirabel were no different. Despite the patent nature of the threat, in their heart of hearts they couldn’t believe it, couldn’t accept anything other than that their cold, sodden and trapped bodies would simply survive. Neither was seriously injured - maybe a cut or two, a bruise or abrasion - but the carriage lay overturned upon them, trapping them more at it sank into the cold, wet peat.
A rational entity would have given up there and then, would have accepted fate and therefore succumbed to the end. Life, however, is far from rational.
“Can you move, Mirabel?”
“Err, mostly, but not my foot. It’s caught somehow.” Phaylan crawled and squeezed through the tangle, squelching his way to where he could feel Mirabel’s leg. It was worryingly cold. It got colder as he encountered her shin, colder still at the ankle.
“It’s the back of the seat that’s pressing it into the peat, but I can’t dig under. This damned canvas!”
“I can’t feel it, Phaylan. It’s gone numb! What’s going to happen? I’m trapped! You won’t leave me, will you?”
“No, no, Mirabel, I won’t leave you, but if one of us doesn’t get out we’ll... Well, one of us needs to go for help.” Phaylan couldn’t deny his own genuine need but kept it to himself.
It was hard to see much at all, what little light the storm allowed failing to get beneath the carriage. All he could really see was a small patch of dull, grey light, just above the surface of their pending peat burial.
It was the edge of the carriage, the cut where they’d normally step in and out, but it was plainly sinking, closing the gap. Phaylan began digging with his hands, with all his might, feverishly, raking his fingers through the peat, lifting unpleasant gases as he did so. As he dug, though, the hole just filled with stinking water, splashing in his face and filling his nose.
Somehow, in all the frenetic, almost panicked thrash of his limbs and the squeeze of his body, Phaylan finally managed to break free, pushed himself clear and slumped to his hands and knees. He shook, partly from the cold but largely through fear. His denial of the truth had been sorely tested but found not to be wanting.
What of Mirabel, though, what of her? What could he really do that would help her, that would warrant the loss of so many precious minutes? He could forge on, even on foot, even cold and soaked, but he’d then be condemning her if not himself.
Despite drawing near his full term, Phaylan recognised the shortcomings still left him by his Galgaverran blood. Perhaps it was those extra years that had brought him his quandary, that set one life so seemingly large against a far greater purpose. What was he to do?
It didn’t help when Mirabel began to pine, when her pleas steadily rose and became overbearing. He couldn’t think how to answer, what to say. Should he lie and thereby sooth her, and how did one lie convincingly?
He was now on his feet; steadier but no more resolute, colder, shivering more, staring at the wreckage. Mirabel’s cries were lessening, turning more to sobs and whines, as though some truth or other had stolen in to keep her cold company.
He stumbled around the carriage to where her sobs were loudest and sank to his knees. “Mirabel? Can you hear me?”
“I’m sorry, Phaylan, my love, my heart, I’ve failed you.”
“Mirabel? Listen to me, please.”
“Are you angry? Is that why you won’t help me?”
“Angry?”
“Do you hate me for snatching the wheel?”
At the very edge of Phaylan’s hearing was an oddly familiar noise that crept along the sodden road. “Snatching the wheel?” he repeated, dully.
“The dark figure startled me, Phaylan, do you see. It ... it scared me.”
“Dark figure?”
“I’m sorry, Phaylan, but I feel so cold ... so sleepy.”
“Mirabel?” There was no answer. “MIRABEL?”
“Yes ... Phaylan? Is that you? Let me sleep, hmm? Ask me later.”
“MIRABEL? Was the figure you saw clothed could you tell? Did it have features, you know, a proper face?”
However much he tried, Phaylan could get no more response from Mirabel, the space beneath the overturned carriage now seeming cold and empty.
“Mirabel?” Phaylan began to plead, “Mirabel? Answer me!” but only the dark peat replied as it squelched and bubbled underfoot.
35 A Turn for the Better
The ridge upon which they’d climbed steadily broadened until the view into Cleofandale was lost to Mount Esnadac’s greater bulk. What should have been a breath-taking vista - down to the dales in the southwest, and beyond to the sea - was now largely hidden behind a wall of rain-laden cloud, one that teetered along Cleofandale’s western ridge.
That was to their left. To their right, though, there was still an expansive view below the lowering cloud. It revealed the mountain’s shoulder, heaving on towards the Scarra Face, to where it looked out across the Eyeswin Vale more than a thousand feet below.
The shoulder was covered in a mass of closely crowded, desolate and depressingly deserted buildings. They formed a crust that was the Upper Reaches, a crust that spilled down the slopes to the ragged, informal wall that enclosed it.
Below was scrub and scarp, and moor and fell, home to little more than sheep. It was only when the mountain’s flank sank to the homely contours of the Esnadales that folk could be found, although precious few these days.
Had Nephril and Falmeard the leisure, they could have turned and looked back down the way they’d come. They could have stared into what little Galgaverre gave away, the even more reclusive Baradcar at its centre.
The cask containing Leiyatel precluded such dalliance, however, and so Nephril looked only to their way ahead. “If thou wouldst but slow, Falmeard, for the road soon turns sharply to the right.”
Nephril had been quite right. As they approached a precipitous rise - the jagged wall of the Upper Reaches running along its top - the road didn’t so much bend as crank to the east. The wealcan had to be manhandled around it, the sparkling column pulsing as though Falmeard’s pushing and pulling did little more than displace green dust.
“I thought ... Leigarre Perfinn was ... was to the west, Nephril?” Falmeard said, gasping for breath.
“It is, thou art quite right.”
“Then ... why are we heading ... east?”
Mounted once more, Nephril pointed up the steep slope. “There be a path along that wall, on our side mind, but one we can only gain from further along, about a mile or so to the east, maybe a bit more.”
The road continued to climb, now cutting a shallow rise across the steep slope. Eventually it reached the wall and levelled off, but still due east, still heading towards the Scarra Face. Nephril asked Falmeard to stop then pointed out their way ahead - behind them.
Falmeard hadn’t noticed the path, one that cut back on their left; beneath the wall still above them. It hardly seemed noticeable even when pointed out, nothing more than rough, grey rock strewn upon hard-packed earth. Great gouges ran ravines along its bed, sculpted by centuries of rain. It now struck Falmeard why the craulena had caterpillar tracks.
“This is the best we get, I am afraid,” Nephril warned. “For the next five miles at least.”
“Five very slow miles I would imagine, Nephril!”
Conversation was plainly inversely proportional to speed for once they’d got the wealcan turned and onto the new but rough and therefore slow way, Nephril began to talk. It was as though he’d bottled everything up, somehow in anticipation of Falmeard’s return. It was only a shame Leiyatel was so near, forcing a degree of caution.
&nb
sp; “I don’t suppose thou will know much of Leiyatel, Falmeard?” He was right. “Well, she is a mixed blessing, mine friend, a very mixed one. Leiyatel is but an engine, a complex one mind but still an engine.”
“And engines do work, eh, Nephril? So, what work’s Leiyatel been doing all these millennia?”
Nephril was impressed by Falmeard’s insight - or perhaps his newly surfacing, long suppressed memories. “Winnowing chance, young Falmeard. She takes her lead from the minds of those about her and uses it to sort wheat from chaff.”
“So that those about her can eat bread I take it, and not chew over dust.”
A smile crept onto Nephril’s face, a smile made easier by being noticeably less pained. “Naturally! We are talking about folk after all.” A flash from a dream suddenly swamped Nephril’s mind with bright, white light, soon darkening to a man’s silhouette, to Falmeard’s silhouette. He stood with his back to Nephril, facing the grand old facade of an ancient town hall, windows like dead men’s eyes. He was reciting something, something pleasant but haunting.
“So folk get what they want, is that it, Nephril?”
“Hmm?”
“The good folk of Dica? They get what their hearts’ desire, you know, an easy life with plenty of food and sex, and whatever else they fancy, booze, football, whatever. Is that it?”
“Err, well, yes. In a nutshell, Falmeard, yes.”
“So where’s the problem?”
“The problem lies in the nature of folk. Soft living gives soft minds.”
“Ah! I think I see what you’re getting at.”
A rough patch of the path appeared, its deeper grooves snatching even the wealcan’s belt. Over the top of its bouncing clatter, as Falmeard fought the laws of dynamics, he shouted, “You sound like a grumpy old man, Nephril, railing against the youth of the day.”
“’Tis nothing to make fun of, Falmeard. Take note, I am in earnest.”
“Sorry, Nephril, but isn’t it just a case of public education or something, something that can be sorted out in good time?”
The five miles of path was fast dwindling, faster than Nephril could marshal his thoughts around such a vast problem. “The living has been so good that the demands on Leiyatel have outstripped her, brought her now so near to extinction.” He dropped his voice. “She is no longer effective, Falmeard, and so the land and its people fail, far faster than they can relearn the old skills.”
“The old skills?”
Falmeard’s question seemed to age Nephril another thousand years. “At survival, Falmeard, survival, as simple as that. How to survive! Dicans risk following Leiyatel to extinction.”
Falmeard continued to wrestle the wealcan until the path became smoother and he could push them on more. They were still beside the wall, the Upper Reaches continuing to spread its tangled mat of roads and buildings on the far side.
Before them lay the barren sweep of the scarp, sloping down to Cleofandale’s scar-topped head – the scarp’s bleak, grey air spilling away over its edge. Even the sheep had deserted their home, scattered eastwards by the looming mass of storm clouds to the west. It seemed the whole world had been divided, separated by a great, black wall behind which Nature wreaked her havoc.
Their way curved across the scarp and straight into that cloud, swallowed whole, wall and all. Falmeard peered at it. “Talking of survival, we’re not really going into that are we?”
“Our only chance, Falmeard, is to bring balance back to the land - to regain Nature’s own balance.”
Falmeard nodded towards the storm. “You mean that kind of balance?”
Nephril grinned. “The turmoil of change, ‘tis all it be. Readjustment to Leiyatel’s pass...” He remembered the cask. “Baradcar will soon be free, Falmeard, free to house the Steward’s new engine, an engine to turn heat into benign power. A power that should see us through the hardest of times.”
Ancient stone slabs started to appear along the path, as though it had once been an important road. Falmeard toyed with taking advantage of them but the storm ahead made him reticent. “So you’re putting Leiyatel safely away, eh, Nephril ... in Leigarre Perfinn?” Nephril didn’t answer. “And Leigarre Perfinn’s in that lot I suppose,” and Falmeard again nodded towards the storm. “Just has to be, knowing my luck.”
“It is, Falmeard, deep beyond the storm’s edge.”
“Then I wish I’d brought my waterproofs. This is going to be pretty unpleasant.”
Nephril started cackling, a rather unnerving sound given the conditions. It made Falmeard feel even more uneasy until Nephril pointed and said, “Down there. Dost thou see a gap in the wall?”
It wasn’t so much a gap as a gateway, not wide but leading off the path at an angle, one Falmeard could easily take at speed. They trundled through onto a broad, smoothly paved road, its setts closely abutted and cambered to a central gutter.
It was a bit of a shock coming from a bleak mountainside into the midst of what should have been bustle. The road here was close-pressed by buildings, the pavements and squares all crying out to be thronged with buyers and pedlars, fishwives and mongers, and all their carts and wares, but only the memory of their ghosts passed by.
“So?” Falmeard said as the road gently curved around to the northeast, towards a canopy of blue sky above a distant desert spread. “Where are we actually going to?”
36 Delaying Tactics
Once final preparations had been completed at Leigarre Perfinn, the Steward’s party retreated to Harlocian for from there they should have been able to follow the wealcan’s route in safety. Harlocian sat on a cliff a few miles northeast of Leigarre Perfinn and a couple of hundred feet above it, well clear of and therefore safe from Leiyatel’s passing.
Halocian should have been below the persistent cloud but they’d no idea if it too would sit within the storm, although it seemed more than likely. It had been largely Bazarran fixation with procedure that had made them travel through the appalling weather to find out.
The rain had lessened, that was true, but visibility there had turned out to be too poor. Had Lady Lambsplitter been with them, they’d have perhaps changed their minds earlier, found somewhere better, but she’d not been seen since early that morning. Melkin thought he would have been thankful but his unfamiliarity with the area had given him second thoughts.
It had been a stroke of luck that their eventual retreat took them past the overturned carriage when it did - after Phaylan had already dragged himself free. Had he not flagged them down they’d have certainly passed by, the small carriage unseen against the rain-sodden and mist-shrouded scarp.
Phaylan had only had to point at it and shout Mirabel’s name for Melkin to spring into action. He, his engers and his aides had all fervently set to righting the carriage, letting Phaylan slip away unnoticed.
One of the convoy’s carriages had been a baggage cart, drawn by a single-seat thrijhil, its coupling soon unfastened. By the time Phaylan was missed and the theft discovered, he was already a mile away to the east, going as fast as he dared.
Despite a few hair-raising moments when he lost sight of the road, after a couple of hours his foolhardy haste brought him unscathed to the edge of the storm. The sudden clear view it gave across Cleofandale made him jerk to a halt, the thrijhil’s three narrow wheels locked and skating across the flags, his heart racing at a resurrected memory.
It had been his first lengthy time away from Galgaverre, and it had been down there in Cleofandale with Lord Nephril where he’d discovered the wonders of the Esnadales. He’d seen them not just with his own youthful eyes but also through ones made poignant by ancient understanding.
For Phaylan that had been a magical journey, one that had sown the seeds of a knowing he’d yet to find, one his blood even now held from him. Perhaps for the good, for the flickering, green column was still in sight, wagging its way through the Upper Reaches to the northeast, moving steadily away towards a long slash of blue sky above a far off desert.
; It appeared that his and Sconner’s suspicions had been right after all, although their reward now seemed to be nothing more than a hopeless pursuit.
37 Nephril’s Lament
The Upper Reaches were largely an elevated urban sprawl, now long abandoned in favour of more pleasant lower regions. Having been built on the very rock of Mount Esnadac, much of its roads and ways were of the rock itself, sculpted to the needs of pavement, kerb and crown. Even after millennia, it still looked fresh, as though the masons had only just put down their tools.
The whole of this district had avoided its share of scuffs and scrapes – the sufferance of centuries of shoes, boots, hooves and wheels – largely through having never been loved. The streets had only ever thronged when pressure of numbers had forced folk here, those unable to hold better tenure elsewhere.
Nephril found it a rather unwelcoming place, but Falmeard seemed strangely at home, even commenting that it felt like an old, well-worn pair of jeans, whatever they were. It was certainly austere, usually cold and windy, but Falmeard seemed to love it. He drove with his head held high, his chest thrust out and his nostrils flared to breath in its bracing air. He looked as though he would have been content enough with silence in which to enjoy it, but Nephril seemed intent on talking.
“It be strange, Falmeard, strange how Leiyatel’s close and raw presence lends me some peace of mind.” Falmeard said nothing, only glanced down at Nephril’s pate, as bare as the properties that now flashed by.
“Here!” Nephril instructed, pointing to the left. “Take this next turn. ‘Tis broad enough and only a shallow angle, though not the most direct. ‘Twill save thee shuffling mine wealcan about, though.”
The turn took them into a shallow stretch that marked their approach to a dip in the mountain’s long shoulder, the views obscured now by their lower position. It gave Nephril more solitude in which to think, to bring him to a realisation.
Last True World (Dica Series Book 3) Page 14