The Fate of the Fallen (The Song of the Tears Book 1)

by Ian Irvine

  ‘I don’t believe you. He can’t be that far ahead, can he, Sergeant?’

  ‘Just minutes, according to Vardo. He saw three men running down the path as we left the air-dreadnought. Vardo had the keenest eyes in the guard.’

  ‘Where is Vardo? Get him down here right away.’

  There was a short pause. ‘He was the first to succumb, surr. He’s the man you ordered up. He wasn’t moving, the last I saw of him. A good man at your back in a battle, was Vardo.’

  ‘No good now, though, is he?’ Another snort. ‘Can you see the true path, Sergeant?’

  ‘I can see a hundred paths, surr, and I can’t tell the difference between any of them.’

  ‘I only see five clearly, but I don’t know which one to take. And the soldiers are useless. Maelys?’

  ‘I see seven paths but I can’t tell which one is true,’ she whispered.

  ‘Lying bitch!’ Drawing a long, heavy gauntlet from a belt hook, he struck her across the face. ‘You’re letting him get away. What about you, girl?’ Vomix clouted Jil over the side of the head.

  ‘It’s all whirling,’ wept Jil, choking with terror. Timfy screamed and thrust his face into her shoulder.

  Vomix scowled, pulled out a dagger and was about to cut her throat when the sergeant said, ‘We may need her later, surr.’

  Vomix lowered the knife. ‘Are you defying me?’ he said dangerously.

  ‘What if the brat’s the only one who can see? We won’t get any sense out of him if you’ve just slaughtered his sister.’

  Vomix slammed the knife into its sheath. ‘You’re right, of course. In places like this, sometimes weakness can mean strength.’ He wrenched Timfy’s head back. ‘Well, brat!’ he roared, spit flying onto the lad’s cheeks. ‘Can you see?’

  The boy tried to pull away. Vomix jerked him back and slapped him with an open hand. He began to wail.

  ‘Surr,’ said the sergeant, ‘I don’t think –’

  ‘Soldiers don’t think,’ said Vomix in a deadly voice. ‘Beating is the only way to get the best out of a brat.’ He raised his hand.

  The sergeant caught it and held it in an unbreakable grip. ‘Stop, surr!’

  Vomix’s other hand flashed to the dagger. ‘Get your filthy hand off me –’

  ‘I am a sergeant in the God-Emperor’s Imperial Militia,’ said the sergeant. ‘And I’m not required to answer to any man, even you, surr, who is acting against my lord’s wishes.’ Tink turned to Maelys. ‘You’ve got your wits about you, girl. Make the lad speak, for all our sakes.’

  Maelys managed to coax Timfy from his sister’s arms and took him a little further down where he could still see Jil, but not Vomix nor the soldiers. ‘Timfy,’ she said, ‘can you tell which way to go?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Can’t you?’

  ‘No, I’m not as strong or clever as you. Nor as brave.’ Timfy swelled a little. ‘Jil and I need you to show us the way out so we can get away from the bad men. Can you lead the way, Timfy?’

  ‘I want my sister.’

  ‘I’ll call her.’ She waved at the sergeant, who brought Jil down. Vomix followed, glowering, then two staggering, cross-eyed soldiers. There was no sign of the others and she imagined what it must be like for them, lost in an unreal place they could not understand, then abandoned by their comrades to madness and death. The Imperial Militia were brutal thugs who doubtless deserved to die but she could still feel pity for them, dying alone down here.

  Timfy strode ahead, proudly and confidently, as if he were walking along the road through Tifferfyte. Maelys could see the path he trod, though it was just one of many arching up, plunging down or curving around in circles, with nothing to distinguish it from any of the others. Behind her one soldier sounded as though he was trying to bring up his intestines. The other wailed and ran up a smoothly curved wall, managing several leaps before he fell backwards onto the path, twitching but unable to get up. The sergeant knelt beside him for a moment, until Vomix angrily called him on.

  ‘Any soldier who falls must be abandoned, sergeant, else the potion will wear off and we’ll be trapped here too.’

  Only Vomix and the sergeant were with them now, and the sergeant was lurching like a drunken man as his small dose of potion wore off and the wild magic of the maze took an ever stronger hold. Vomix, unfortunately, seemed little worse than he’d been at the beginning, for he kept casting charms on himself to ward off the multiple visions. Each charm appeared to hurt him more than the previous one, though he soon recovered. Afraid to touch Maelys now, he drove her on by pricking her back with his knife, muttering dire threats should she lead him astray.

  Maelys endured it as best she could while she tried to work out what had happened at the Mistmurk. After she’d arrived at Tifferfyte, Monkshart had told Phrune that she had no aura at all – and therefore, no talent. But after touching Maelys, Vomix had been stung or burned by her odd aura. Had passage through the Mistmurk changed her in some fashion?

  She didn’t think she could keep going much longer. The potion was wearing off and she could see so many intersecting, quivering pathways that her mind had begun to rebel and reject all of them, even the one she was standing on. She felt giddy all the time and was having trouble telling up from down. Jil had bound a strip of cloth over her eyes: only terror for her brother kept her on her feet.

  Vomix’s rage was swelling all the time. Prevented by the sergeant from harming Timfy or Jil, he took it out on Maelys, though he was careful only to touch her with the gauntlets. He was grunting and gasping; strings of slobber dangled from the dense black stubble which had sprouted on his chin. Maelys felt sure he was being driven mad by the maze, and aftersickness from the dangerous charms he was using to keep it at bay.

  Wait – none of them really mattered to him, but Nish did, and if Vomix brought Nish back unharmed it would make him. So if she could offer him that hope there might be a chance …

  ‘A light, a light,’ she lied, pointing in a wavering circle, forwards. ‘Nish, help –’

  The maze hadn’t affected Vomix’s reflexes. He sprang at her, knocking Jil and Timfy out of the way, and slapped his reeking gauntlet across Maelys’s mouth and nose.

  ‘You’ll live to regret that,’ he hissed. Thrusting her sprawling, he peered into the maze. ‘Where’s the light? I don’t see it.’

  ‘There.’ She gestured to where a narrow grey path appeared to coil up and over, before plunging down precipitously. ‘Halfway down the further slope.’

  ‘I can’t see anything,’ Vomix growled.

  ‘You can see it, can’t you, Timfy?’ Maelys said desperately, knowing that Timfy would say no and then, likely as not, Vomix would plunge his sword right through her. ‘Can’t you?’

  Timfy looked up and said, with the perfect innocence of a child, ‘I saw the light ages ago. It was climbing up but now it’s going down again.’ He pointed somewhat to the right. She could have hugged him.

  Vomix looked from Timfy to her, breathing heavily, then back to Timfy. ‘You pointed further left,’ he said to Maelys.

  ‘No, that way.’ She described another shaky circle in the air, her arm trembling so badly that she could barely hold it out.

  His eyes narrowed, but a spasm racked him and bile-green saliva trickled from the corner of his mouth. He managed to gasp, ‘Follow the light, and be quick about it.’ He made a gesture as if blessing himself, renewing the painful illusion-breaking charm. ‘Aahhh!’ he roared, doubling over and holding his stomach.

  Maelys moved backwards to safety, knowing that he’d lash out the moment he’d recovered. If she could keep him at bay long enough, aftersickness must build up until he couldn’t resist it.

  As she turned away, a gauntleted blow drove her to her knees, then Vomix spat a green gob beside her. ‘Liar!’ he roared, jerking her up and around to face him. ‘My charm tells me that there is no light. How dare you coax the boy to lie for you?’

  He swung another wild blow, which glanced off h
er shoulder. ‘But you know! You’ve known where Cryl-Nish and the traitors were all along and you’ve been leading the boy astray so they could escape.’ He reached out with the knife. ‘You’ll show –’

  Maelys couldn’t take any more. She lunged, bringing her right knee up so hard between his legs that she felt something burst. He shrieked and collapsed on top of her. She thrust his vomit-crusted face away, wriggled out from under him and flicked a glance to her left. The sergeant had his sword out but his eyes were crossed and he kept jerking his head left and right, as if that were the only way he could focus. It was the only chance they’d get.

  ‘Run for the light!’ she hissed in Timfy’s ear.

  Timfy didn’t move. ‘Jil?’ he said anxiously.

  Jil’s nose was running and she was staggering like a newborn calf. Maelys caught her around the shoulders. ‘Run ahead, Timfy!’ she hissed. ‘Show us the way. If we can get out of sight the bad men won’t be able to find us again.’

  He took his sister’s hand and began to pull her along as fast as she could stagger. Maelys looked down. Vomix was still squirming on the ground, making a thin squeal like an animal chewing its leg off to escape a trap. His knife was in its sheath, partly under him. She had her hand on the hilt when he rolled over onto his side and drew his legs up. His eyes were screwed closed, and if she snatched the knife and buried it in his heart it would all be over.

  She reached for it but it was now trapped under him and she wasn’t game to roll him over; he didn’t look completely incapacitated. Besides, she didn’t think she could kill him in cold blood, monster though he was. It was a weakness she might come to regret but it wasn’t in her to do it. Maelys backed away.

  The sergeant began to lurch after them, now in a rush, now wobbling from side to side, but his path was like an ant meandering across a sheet of paper and he soon began to head in the wrong direction.

  She didn’t look back, though shortly she heard a shriek when Vomix realised that they’d escaped. Why hadn’t she used the knife?

  On Maelys staggered, and on. Hours had gone by since they’d escaped, and the maze was brightening by the minute. She felt weak from hunger and thirst. Jil was as blanched as an almond and her cracked lips were bleeding.

  Only Timfy was unaffected, but there seemed no end to the maze and Maelys had lost hope of his finding a way out. Soon, when she could go no further, they were all going to die here.

  Jil sat down suddenly and covered her face with her arms. ‘Can you see the way, Timfy?’ Maelys said, as she had many times before.

  ‘No,’ he croaked. ‘But the light is getting brighter.’

  ‘It must be daytime outside,’ she murmured.

  ‘No, the light is getting brighter.’

  ‘That’s what I just said – what light?’

  ‘The light I’ve been following.’

  It took an agonisingly long time to take in what he’d said. ‘You mean there is a light? I thought you made that up.’

  Timfy looked shocked. ‘Only bad people tell lies.’

  ‘Sometimes good people have to …’ She didn’t have the energy. ‘Where is it?’

  His thin arm pointed. ‘There.’

  The maze shifted sickeningly as she tried to focus, as if it were responding to her feelings and deliberately trying to frustrate her. She squinted, which helped a little, so she closed one eye. Everything settled down and she saw a small, jiggling yellow point in the distance, though it made her nauseous to focus on it and she couldn’t have followed it far.

  ‘Are we getting closer?’

  ‘No. It’s going faster now.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you can find a quicker way through the maze?’

  He licked his lips, but didn’t answer for some time, as if afraid he’d get into trouble. ‘I know how to get out.’ He wasn’t looking at her, nor at his sister, who was now lying on her side with her knees drawn up.

  ‘How did you discover that?’

  ‘I saw it ages ago.’

  She couldn’t restrain herself, snapping, ‘Then why didn’t you tell me?’

  Timfy jumped backwards and she regretted it instantly. ‘The bad man told me to follow the light and I was scared … scared he’d hurt Jil.’

  ‘Sorry, Timfy. I’m not cross with you.’ Going down on her knees before him, she took his hand. ‘Do you think, if we went straight to the way out, we could get there by the time they do?’ She nodded in the direction of the light.

  ‘We’ll get there first.’

  ‘Good boy. I’ll carry Jil. Lead the way, but don’t go too fast.’

  He waited until she had heaved Jil over her shoulder, then set off proudly, taking a path to their left which she hadn’t realised was there. It went down steeply and became a blocky, square staircase. She followed as best she could, trying not to think, squinting through one eye so as to block out the shifting paths. They went along a springy track, like a sheet of rubber stretched across a gorge, waded through something invisible that dragged at her legs, then climbed a long incline to a lookout shaped like a segment of an orange, enclosed on the curved side by a shoulder-high wall with a warm, fleshy feel.

  Maelys peered over. Most of the alternative paths had disappeared and the others had faded to barely visible lines, but the true path was clear now, and other details were becoming visible for the first time. The track wound back and forth down a steep slope to a small rest station consisting of four columns and a pointed roof. Below that, another path running from the right joined theirs and it turned towards a transparent tunnel, beyond which she thought she could faintly see something real – trees and rocks.

  ‘Is that the way out, Timfy?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘We’ll wait down there under the roof,’ she said, weak with relief. There was no reason to seek shelter since there was no sun in the maze, no weather, not even a sky, but it looked safer there. ‘It’s not far now, Jil. Do you think you can walk?’

  Jil opened her eyes, winced at the brightness and looked around, more alert than she’d been in hours. The wild power of the maze must be weakening as they approached the exit. ‘Yes,’ she croaked. ‘I think I’ll be all right now.’

  Maelys took her arm. They went down slowly and settled onto the floor of the way station. There was no dust. She put her back against a column and closed her eyes, thinking about Nish and what he’d say when he saw her. She refused to believe that he’d left her behind deliberately. There had to be another explanation. She prayed that there was.

  She must have dozed, for an unexpected sound jerked her awake. Jil was asleep on her back, breathing through her cracked lips and snoring softly. Timfy was snuggled up to his sister, also asleep. Since the other path went right past the way station and no one could go by without seeing them, Maelys hunched herself up, getting as comfortable as she could, and closed her eyes.

  She was just dozing off when the sound came again, though this time she recognised it for what it was. It wasn’t Jil snoring, but a snorting chuckle. She scrambled to her feet, heart pounding, as a man stepped out from behind the far column of the way station. Seneschal Vomix grinned, snapped his fingers and her legs went rigid.

  ‘How …?’ she managed to gasp. Her lips had gone as stiff as old rubber.

  ‘I knew you were hiding something,’ he gloated, moving closer but careful not to touch, ‘so I set a trap and you fell right into it. Did you really think you could disable me with such a crude blow? I let you get away; I knew one of you would lead me to Cryl-Nish.’

  ‘How did you find us?’

  With another click of his fingers, a shining thread appeared in the air, looping back and forth across the pavilion then halfway up the hill. It began at her back and ended in a coil in his hand. He tossed it in the air and it vanished. He must have put the spell on her when he’d thumped her on the back.

  ‘It was as easy as following a line,’ he sneered. ‘You don’t become the God-Emperor’s seneschal without knowing every trick there
is.’ Glancing towards the exit, he smiled. ‘I’ll have my full strength back by the time your friends come by.’

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Vomix took them up the track to a point where he could see the other path without being seen, then disappeared, shortly to return supporting the sergeant, who looked as though he’d fallen down a set of stairs.

  His nostrils were caked with blood, he’d lost four front teeth and his face was so bruised and swollen that he couldn’t see out of his left eye. He limped along, supporting himself on the point of his sword, though from the blood seeping from the toe of his right boot he must have skewered his foot at some stage. But he looked alert again. It would not be easy to get away a second time.

  The seneschal let him fall and the sergeant slumped on the ground, breathing raggedly. ‘Pull yourself together, Sergeant,’ said Vomix, stirring him in the ribs with a boot toe. ‘You militiamen are supposed to be tough. They’ll be here in a few minutes. And don’t breathe so damn loud.’ Shading his eyes with his hand, for the light was brightening all the time, he stared back into the transparencies of the maze.

  Maelys couldn’t see anyone coming, though she didn’t doubt that they were. However, she couldn’t warn them for she could neither move nor speak. Jil lay where Vomix had dropped her, eyes closed. The boy was slumped against a rock, fast asleep, and Maelys hoped he’d stay that way through the coming attack. He’d done more than anyone could ask of a child, and seen more than any child should see.

  Shortly, staring down at the other path, she saw something move in the distance. They were coming. Her gut tightened and her heart began to race. She tried not to react, but Vomix, watching her, grinned like a hyena. Hauling the sergeant to his feet, Vomix worked hairy fingers over his head in what Maelys assumed to be a rejuvenation spell. The sergeant immediately stood up straighter, though he still needed the support of his sword.

  ‘Go down to the ambush point,’ said Vomix. ‘Keep under cover.’