Ulryk remained silent. The stone raft drifted closer to the shoreline and a few of the white glows took their human and rumel forms more clearly. They stood in groups of two or three, gazing as the raft came in. The dreary, dreamlike silhouette of a broken city lay behind them – the rising towers in decay, half crumbling, if not already a wreck; walls with notable damage; black, windowless frames. Before the city, running down to the water’s edge, was a dark pebble beach.
‘My quest,’ Ulryk finally replied, ‘is simply to use the book to return its author to his world.’
‘This Frater Mercury guy?’
‘You have a fine memory, investigator. It does you credit.’
‘And just what is Frater Mercury going to do when he is back? Do you even know if he’s anything more than a myth? I get the impression a lot of this is based on faith.’
‘Much of all we do is based on faith, investigator. I have been . . . conversing with him. Through various methods and rituals. Through dimensions. He is quite real. His world is spilling through into ours, and you know already of the genocides and wars in the north. Here is evidence.’
‘That’s not evidence of him, though.’
‘I have seen what I need to. Not everything can be proven. We need faith in the things we cannot see.’
Fulcrom was stunned. How could anyone communicate through dimensions? Then he realized by his questioning he actually believed everything that Ulryk was saying. Just because you’ve seen the dead doesn’t mean all he says is true.
They sailed to the shoreline, where a white figure – with a much gentler glow up close – helped them up.
‘Back so soon, eh, Ulryk?’ he called out, much to Fulcrom’s surprise, in a traditional dialect. The man was bald, tall, muscular, wearing ancient fashions, high collared shirts and a knee-length tunic. His nose and chin were thin and long, giving him an almost bird-like appearance, and his skin was dark like dusk – no, only the right side of his face, because the other was pale, and no matter how hard Fulcrom looked, he could not see the bisecting line down his face. ‘Brought a friend this time, I see.’
‘This is Investigator Fulcrom,’ Ulryk said, climbing off the raft.
‘Oh, aye. We’ve some Inquisition members here who still fancy themselves in charge of law and order. Not that there’s much point, heh. Anyway. Welcome, sir. My name is Aker.’ The old ghost offered a hand, and Fulcrom, pushing himself upright, didn’t know whether or not to take it, whether he would grip onto nothing. He did take it, in the end – and the grip was quite real. A moment later and two huge waist-high cats padded down across the stones to Aker’s side and, when seated, eyed Fulcrom suspiciously.
‘Don’t mind these two,’ Aker said. ‘They just ain’t too fond of the living. Sets ’em off.’
And I’m not too fond of the dead, Fulcrom thought, watching one lick its paw. ‘Do you get many of the living here?’
‘No, I’ll give you that. Just Ulryk here.’
Fulcrom and Ulryk were guided further onto land where more of the figures greeted them.
‘These are all the dead,’ Ulryk whispered on approach. ‘Many followed me back to see what the world was like again. Some had unfinished business, you see, or people they wanted to see. I can only assume the rest here didn’t want to leave.’
The dead appeared much like the living, but wore the wounds that had finally killed them. They also possessed an ethereal shine, similar to the one that Adena had possessed. Clothing spanned history, and Fulcrom noticed various costumes or styles from tapestries or paintings he’d seen over the years. In groups, they came and went, seeing the spectacle of the living visit them. ‘How many are left here?’ Ulryk called to Aker, who was following with his cats weaving around behind him. Then, to Fulcrom, Ulryk whispered, ‘I think this fellow is some kind of gatekeeper.’
‘Oh, I would say around a hundred or so,’ Aker boomed. ‘People prefer to stay around for the most part. Living ain’t what it used to be. Besides, a few who tried to cross the river felt too weak – didn’t have the determination to go on, so to speak.’
‘I do not suppose you bear news on the location of the book I sought?’
‘Aye a few of the locals were thinking about this. There are old libraries down here, too, though wrecks these days. Much like the rest of the place. But nothing yet, I’m afraid. They’ll keep looking. It keeps them busy, since life can get dull round these parts.’
They passed through a massive iron gate set into dark stone walls. Huge cracks penetrated the stone, splitting it completely in places, and Fulcrom noticed how the design of the walls was much like Villjamur, as if it mirrored its style, yet had suffered from the impacts of some apocalyptic event.
Fulcrom shook his head in disbelief. The city was laid out similarly, roads banking up either side in a circular route. The buildings, tall and narrow, were leaning precariously upon each other, crumbling or ready to break. It was unnaturally warm. Two dead men were playing cards on a table in the street, one with a knife protruding from his back. There were plazas and courtyards, parks with dead trees, and the dead were everywhere. Fulcrom felt an overwhelming and unexplained sorrow, which was met with his refusal to accept what he was seeing. Nothing made sense any more, nothing at all. Were these genuinely the remains of those who had died from the surface world?
‘I’ve seen enough,’ Fulcrom said. ‘I ought to return to my duties on the surface.’
‘Ha, typical of the livin’, that,’ an old man said. ‘Always concerned with duties and jobs. Try enjoying life a bit while you still got it, yeah?’
‘I enjoy my job,’ Fulcrom muttered. ‘I make a difference.’ There was more defensiveness in this final statement then he would have liked. Then to Ulryk, ‘Please . . . I can’t stay here. I can’t bear to look.’
Ulryk placed a hand on each arm as if he was going to shake Fulcrom. ‘You wanted explanations, investigator. And I wanted you to believe. I will need your help, most definitely in the coming days. I know a man of logic when I see him – and you needed convincing. This, I feel, has helped. Have faith in me and what I am doing – your world is about to change greatly.
‘I know that the church has ordered creatures into the city. When I find the other copy of The Book of Transformations, I will need to conduct rituals upon the surface. It may take me a good while to ascertain the details, and in this time I will need your protection, as much of it as you can offer. I will require your faith in me. There are few who will be able to believe in what is going on here, few who can offer such loyalty.’
‘I think’, Fulcrom whispered, ‘that you can relax. I believe in you.’
The smile on the priest’s face was tinged more with relief than happiness.
‘Though tell me,’ Fulcrom began, forcing his mind back towards logic, ‘what about the dead who have gone to the surface? They need to be returned here, don’t they?’ All the time his thoughts were on Adena, and how to rid himself of her ghost.
Aker interrupted them. ‘The thing is, any of those who have gone up need to be persuaded to come back down.’
Fulcrom breathed steadily, his eyes widening.
Aker laughed, rubbing the ears of one of his cats. With a face of pure contentment, the beast crooked its neck to allow further scratching.
‘What’s up, sir?’ Aker asked. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost!’
TWENTY-FIVE
On the south coast of Tineag’l, the remnants of the Order of the Equinox discovered yet another abandoned town. The absence of any residents heightened Verain’s sense of fear.
They had to wade through the snow in order to get along its streets, which had so clearly and so recently experienced carnage. Streaks of blood were splattered across the facades of wooden buildings. The heavy layer of snow probably hid much of the gore below.
There was little wind today, and the sunlight was stronger than the far north of the islands, where the Realm Gates were located. It was warmer here too – just a degree or
two, but enough to raise her spirits.
‘Tuung, why can’t I remember his name?’ Verain pointed to one of the other cultists who travelled with them, a young blond man who seemed physically fit and who spoke with an optimism she herself was lacking. ‘Did he accompany us when we left Villjamur?’
Tuung frowned. ‘Of course he did, lass. You honestly don’t remember?’
‘No.’ She felt she recognized his features, though searching beyond that yielded little. ‘It’s Todi,’ Tuung replied, his expression changing from one of amusement to something more serious. ‘We’re good mates, me and him.’
‘I’m sure it’s just the cold,’ she lied. ‘Yes, his face is very familiar. Todi.’
‘Good thing we’re stopping for the night, lass. If we can find a room that hasn’t got a corpse in it, we can maybe get a good fire going and get some food down. You look as though you could do with a good meal.’
Houses bordered the two main streets, which ran parallel to the coastline, and there were a few other lanes trailing out like vines into open country. The buildings had been painted garish colours: yellows, blues and greens, as if to brighten what was, otherwise, a desolate community.
A street backed onto a large harbour, one filled with towering industrial vessels with old fishing boats jammed between. This was a small port town, Verain realized, one used to export the ore that was the lifeblood of the mining island. It was probably once a bustling area, with stevedores and blacksmiths and enterprise.
Now it was a ghost port. There was no life here, no community, only the lingering sense of what once had been.
Though her memory was betraying her, she could remember that they had passed through settlements such as this on their way north in search of the Realm Gates. So many towns and villages had been cleared of their inhabitants. Farmed for their inhabitants, in fact – only the corpses of the very young and very old remained. Yes, I remember Todi now. He was the one who threw up when we found the corpse of an old lady in her bathtub. That’s right.
The recollection gave her some relief. Perhaps it really was the cold that was fogging her memory. The cultists had surveyed the town and, unlike the others, they found few bodies at all. The houses looked like they’d been vacated in a hurry, with doors open and food left on stoves.
From further along the docks, Dartun came marching towards them, effortlessly kicking up snow. A couple of the dogs bounded behind him. He looked so normal just then, simply a man walking animals by the sea.
‘I’ve found a good vessel,’ Dartun announced, full of optimism. ‘It’s ideal – a small, military longship, with ample shelter for us all. We might have to leave the dogs though.’
‘Did you see if there were any of . . . you know. Them?’ Verain asked. ‘They could be hiding somewhere for all we know.’
‘They don’t concern us,’ Dartun said coolly.
‘How can you say that?’ Tuung snapped. ‘You know what they’re doing to these people around here, and we saw it with our own eyes when we passed into their world.’
Verain’s memory sparked:
The cities beyond the gates were hideous. There had been meat factories through which naked humans were herded like livestock. Verain had seen men and women scream as they were forced through great, mechanical devices, never to be seen again. They were processed for their materials – flesh and organs were used for food, their bones were used for construction materials. Smoke filled the skies, leaving a chemical taint in the air, the sun barely seen through the pollution, and it was cold, colder than she had ever imagined . . .
‘They will leave us alone,’ Dartun replied, bringing Verain back to the here and now. ‘They have no interest in us.’
‘How do you know that?’ Verain asked. ‘They could be hiding behind any of these buildings’ – she waved to a row of abandoned houses – ‘waiting just to murder us.’
‘Nonsense,’ Dartun laughed. ‘If you remember, we walked away from the Realm Gates, right past those who are responsible for the harvesting of these islands.’
There was something accepting about the way he said harvesting. As if it didn’t seem at all cruel to him that there had been a mass genocide.
‘And why was that, Dartun?’ Tuung demanded. Verain held her breath waiting to see what their Godhi would make of such boldness. ‘Why did they just let us stroll back from their world?’
The other cultists had gathered behind Verain and Tuung now, all facing Dartun and waiting for an answer. Whilst they were relieved to have escaped that other world, they wanted answers to why they were free. Why they had been permitted to leave when so many others had not.
‘Not only that,’ Tuung pressed, ‘but how come you’re enhanced? How come you’ve got a fancy new arm, the one you used so well when you murdered a whole other band of cultists?’
Their leader didn’t respond with his usual confrontational statements, nor did he inspire them with his passionate rhetoric. He just ignored them. ‘We rest tonight,’ Dartun said finally. ‘I’ve located a house with a dormitory. We can shelter safely together, light a fire, and be warm and relaxed.’ He reached down to ruffle a dog’s neck, and the animal sat up excitedly. ‘It’s around the corner, a white two-storey building with a green double door. I’ll be in there if you need me.’ And with that he tromped away through the snow.
The remains of the Order of the Equinox looked at each other, and in their silence waited for someone to say something, anything.
Tuung muttered, ‘Since when has he been so concerned with our safety, eh?’
‘You’re thinking of splitting?’ Todi asked, a worried look on the young man’s face.
‘Well, I mean he marches us up to the top of the world just to march us back again. Into hell and back out again. I’ve no complaints with where we’re going now. I just want to get home to Villjamur. If he wants to keep us warm and safe all of a sudden then . . . well, that’s fine with me. I’m not going anywhere, but I don’t like the stuff that’s going unsaid. What about you, lass? You’re closer to him than anyone else.’
All eyes turned to Verain. ‘Maybe I can have a word with him tonight, and find out what’s going on.’
Although she didn’t hold much hope. Dartun had changed. And not just physically. She wasn’t sure there was anything left of the man she had once loved.
*
They sprawled in a school room. It was the first night that they had not all huddled together in one large, canvas tent. All six cultists sat around a wood-burning stove, staring into the flames, letting the heat bring them back to some kind of conscious state and, for a long time, no one said a word. This was luxury.
After witnessing the horrors of the otherworld, Verain felt surreal looking at the crude and innocent paintings that adorned one wall. There were brightly coloured toys and books at one end, and a few tables at the other, everything muted by the soft orange light of the fire. Tuung had located well-preserved provisions in a kitchen. They had eaten ravenously. They had not seen so much food in . . . she didn’t know how long. Two men were in a blissful state of satiation, in a deep state of slumber, and Dartun simply stared into the flames, barely moving. There were questions she wished to ask, but not here, not in front of the others.
She wandered upstairs into a tiny, decrepit library. The light of the moons passed through shutters and slanted across the desk. She had spent the last few days with five other men around her, where even simple tasks such as urinating became an embarrassment. Alone, finally, she could gather her thoughts. If she was honest with herself, she wished Dartun would join her up here, just so she could see if there was any slight chance she could do something to make him change back to how he had been.
Using a drawstring, she opened the shutters fully, and gazed through the murky glass. That’s odd . . . The horizon to the east revealed a strange line of light, a thin orange glow pressed into the dark distance, and now she felt – very slightly – that the room was shuddering.
Was this som
e geological phenomenon? It didn’t look like it.
The line of light was shifting. It must have been some way off, but it was definitely moving, and drifting towards the coast. She allowed her eyes to adjust over a few minutes, but nothing more could be gleaned from the sight.
Footsteps up the stairs . . .
She spun back, her heart beating furiously, as Dartun pushed open the door.
A sigh of relief, a surge of adrenalin that she could now press him further. I care for him – I’m not going to let him grow into some . . . monster.
‘I trust you will be better company than those downstairs,’ he said, more gentle than she’d heard him speak for a long time.
‘They’re well fed, for once, and very tired.’
‘Yes, I forget just how exhausted the human body can get.’
‘That implies you don’t have a human body,’ she suggested, tracing the scars on his face, the exposed metal. ‘I saw what happened with Papus – we all did. That wasn’t normal, Dartun.’
Now that she had voiced her concerns, she feared what might happen. Silence stretched out before them. He seemed quite inert, as if he was incapable of formulating an answer.
‘Dartun, what happened in that other world? We were lovers before we went away, and now we’re back I don’t even know where we stand. But I’m not saying this for me – I care about you.’ She took his hands in her own. In the moonlight, his scars muted by the dim light, his face regained much of its handsomeness. His expression was contemplative. ‘What happened, Dartun? What did they do to us . . . to you?’
‘I can’t remember, Verain. I really can’t.’
‘You’re lying. The rest of our order was wiped out – I remember that. The specimens of the undead you took with us – they’re gone. There’s just a few of us left now and you’re dragging us halfway across the world without any explanation. You must tell us something, Dartun – you can’t force people just to follow you again without some reason to.’
His face darkened and his breathing quickened. ‘I wanted immortality,’ he said, ‘and I think I’ve found it. You remember the cages in which we were kept?’
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