And only because she promised I could talk about her at the end.
Remember, Avane. You promised.
I had mostly finished scattering the traitor’s parts when Eva got hold of me. I need you to collect all that back up again, Ny! That wasn’t fair of you, Ny! That was too cruel!
Too cruel, huh. Why was it not “too cruel” of Rastivan to betray us? I felt a tiny bit like biting off her head, but of course I did not. That really would be too cruel.
Eva scares me.
There, I have been honest. They told me to be honest, didn’t they? I don’t like to admit it. She is a human, and insists on clinging on to that shape. As if it’s all that great. But I am glad she doesn’t adopt a draykon shape after all, because if she can terrify me as a mere spindly human, what would she be like as a drayk?!
It is something to do with the way she looks at you when she is displeased. A winter-cold quality to her voice when she says things like, Nyden! I am displeased with you! A look in her eye that says, if I were not such a fine lady I would have you minced and fed to my pets.
She would, too. For all her talk of too cruel, when she is truly angered with you she will feed you to Pensould. Just ask Krays.
Anyway, I am trying to explain why a mighty dark-as-the-night-and-twice-as-cunning fellow like me consented to obey her order. I could have refused, and if I had, I do not think anybody would have been able to reassemble all of the rancid Rastivan’s parts. I had scattered them too far and wide, and hidden them too cleverly.
But I did not refuse, because I do not want to be minced and fed to Eva’s pets. Or to Pensould. And because Avane agreed with Eva and how could I resist that?
She promised to help me, and so off we went together, with a trifling assistance here and there from Gio. It took us a while, and Avane only threw up the contents of her pretty stomach three times over, is that not wonderfully resilient? I was so proud of her I could almost have burst with it.
We were delayed for an hour or two by the persistent absence of Rastivan’s left forefinger. I could have sworn I had left that one in a dining room at Sulayn Phay but it turned out I had dropped it on the street outside Eva’s headquarters instead. Perhaps I was hoping she would find it, when next she stepped out for some air, and promptly lose her lunch.
Reviving a dead draykon is no easy task, I need not tell you. Raising the dead cannot possibly be easy. How wonderfully macabre it sounds! Avane and I worked together on the project, and we made a beautiful team. I have no doubt she felt it, too. Afterwards we were exhausted, for it is necessary to employ one’s own energies in order to reinvigorate those of the deceased. But it was a successful venture. Rastivan’s severed bits and pieces knitted themselves back together, his ravaged body healed over, and he began to breathe again.
We conducted this procedure in a tiny antechamber at Sulayn Phay. It was a featureless little space, somewhere out-of-the-way that we seized upon because it was the first convenient spot that we found. It had no real furniture, the walls were the colour of vomit and it stank of some repellent substance I could not identify, but it served our purposes.
Rastivan awoke. His nose wrinkled as he encountered that delightful aroma, and I congratulated us for inadvertently ensuring that his waking should be as unpleasant as possible.
He began to shiver, and it occurred to me that it was a bit cold in there.
Avane fussed over him at once, while I sat back on my haunches and fixed him with a murderous glower. This I could not help. I may have been instrumental in returning him to life, but that did not mean I had to pretend that I liked it. I wanted to kill him again, but Avane was right there and I had already made her throw up thrice. By that time I was beginning to wonder if she really, truly liked me after all, so I left Rastivan in one piece.
He should consider himself lucky.
‘Keep him away from me!’ said the traitor, staring at me with a white-faced horror that gratified me deeply.
‘There, there,’ said Avane. ‘The nasty thing won’t come anywhere near you.’
That did not gratify me at all.
‘Nasty! Avane, he sold umpteen draykoni to Dwinal!’
‘Yes, and that was very bad indeed,’ Avane agreed. ‘But he did so under foul coercion, and he is sorry for it now. Aren’t you?’ This last she said with a winning smile at Rastivan, and my heart contracted, for he would fall in love with her on the spot. He had to. And what if she decided she liked him better than me? What if ripping a man to shreds and scattering about his parts turned out to be worse, in her estimation, than merely handing sixteen of one’s kind over to an abominable creature like Dwinal? More than sixteen! There is Nindrinat, too! Seventeen. What could be worse than that? But Avane might not agree.
I was so worried I forgot to talk. Anyone who knows me will realise that is a bad sign indeed, but Avane did not even notice.
‘Those draykoni are in deep trouble,’ she said to him. ‘We have only been able to extract a few of them. The rest are trapped on Orlind, bound and in distress. We need you to help us.’
I scoffed. What could Rastivan do to help? He was the reason they were in trouble!
But I could see that he was swayed. Perhaps it was the fact that I had already torn him limb-from-limb once and I was sitting nearby, obviously dying to do it again. Or maybe it was Avane’s sweet loveliness that turned his black heart. Either way, he fell to blubbering and begging forgiveness, an attitude he occasionally interspersed with justifications of the but she threatened me! variety. Pah.
‘I will threaten you again, if it would help.’ I said this with my teeth showing, and the effect upon Rastivan was profound, if I do say so myself.
Avane shot me a shut up, Nyden look.
I shut up.
‘What did she do to the people you sent her?’ Avane asked of Rastivan. She was kneeling by his side, the weakling being still stretched upon the floor where we had put him. I hated to see her like that, bending over him all tenderly, caring for him like he was worth something. ‘How did she trap them?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said, eyes wide as he stared at Avane. He was falling in love with her! I knew it!
The bastard. Next time I would eat him. Watch Eva try to bring him back from that.
‘Are you sure? Is there nothing you can tell us?’
He licked his lips. They were probably dry and no wonder, I suppose he had not had anything to drink in a while. You know, being dead. ‘She had help.’
Avane stiffened. ‘What kind of help?’
‘There were five of us. The others were all Elders, but not me. My job was to find sleeping draykoni and deliver them to her. Live ones, too, if I could. But the other four, they were there to subdue the ones I brought in. They worked together, made a — a kind of vortex of amasku. It made me dizzy just being near it. Nobody could fight it. It was twisted somehow, she’d twisted it.’
‘Who are the other four? Where are they?’ Avane looked electrified, and sickened. She looked once at me, and the look of anguish in her beautiful eyes cut me to the quick.
Yes, I have a heart. Really. I may be darker than the night, but I am soft as cloudy wood-moss in the middle. All right? Satisfied? Let’s move on.
‘I don’t know! Really, I do not. They were not woken by me, and I did not see them often. When I did see them, they were always with Dwinal…’
Avane sat back on her heels. She shook her head, at a loss. ‘I don’t know if it’s enough to help,’ she said to me. ‘But Eva needs to know about this, at once.’
I regretted that Gio had sauntered off somewhere, for we could have used him at that moment.
I knew one thing: I have not seen any other draykoni wandering around Sulayn Phay. Other than my own friends, of course. That may mean they are usually absent from the Library, so we are not likely to encounter them. Or it may mean that they are so well camouflaged that even I cannot spot them…
‘We must find Eva.’ Avane scrambled to her feet, and held out her ha
nd to Rastivan.
The process of helping him up was not easy, and I revelled in his sheer unattractiveness as he staggered about, weak-legged and grey-faced. Hah. As if Avane could ever admire that!
Once he was on his feet and mostly stable, she looked expectantly at me.
‘What?’
‘Either you help Rastivan and I find Eva, or the other way around.’
Oh. The man could hardly walk, so “helping him” would doubtless consist of supporting him. Which would mean being near him. Touching him.
I was torn. I didn’t want to touch him myself, ever again. Who knows, cowardice might be contagious! But I definitely didn’t want Avane getting anywhere near him, either. What if he hurt her? What if she fell for him?
‘Ny!’
‘Right! Sorry! I’ll find Eva.’ I hated to say it but I could by no means trust myself not to bite Rastivan’s head off if I were left in close proximity with him, so it would have to be the other option.
I turned my back before I could see Avane go to his side and put his arm over her shoulders.
[Edited to add: Nyden was so caught up in the tale, he forgot to capitalise upon his promised opportunity to rhapsodise about Avane. Later, he was most upset to realise this. I have therefore consented to permit him to insert it prior to the book’s publication, in hopes of shutting him up. - Lady Glostrum].
Have you ever seen Avane? Probably not. Picture a glorious sunset. Picture the most beautiful dawn you have ever experienced. Imagine a serene cove, waters lapping gently at a white beach… imagine a sun-kissed forest, dew twinkling softly upon tender, unfurling leaves… none of this comes close to encapsulating Avane’s pure perfection.
And that is only to touch upon the subject of her face. What can I say about her heart? Purer than pure! Is there no one she cannot love? No deed so foul that she cannot forgive? She puts all others to shame, casts all other women into the shade—
[And that’s enough. - Lady Glostrum].
Eva: The Tangled Web is… Still Tangled.
So there we were, camped out on the edge of the contested island of Orlind, surrounded by draykoni taking a nice, comfortable nap while we were tearing out our hair trying to find a way to rouse them.
What did we imagine we could do? Tren and I are both draykon enough to wield the arts we call “Sorcery” and “Summoning” with prodigious skill, but… that’s about it. We know nothing of the deeper arts the draykoni employ. There was, on that day, one single advantage to this state of ignorant incapacity; that being that we were largely impervious to whatever twist in the amasku was keeping our draykoni companions bound in slumber.
But so what? That merely left us free to run in circles around them, flapping our arms and generally getting nowhere. Nor was it a balmy day on Orlind. Clouds had settled over the sea and drifted landwards, bringing an endless, drizzling rain with them. The air was dank and chill, my silken garments were increasingly soaked and I was not dressed for such nonsense.
I tell you, I have rarely felt so ineffectual in my life, or so surplus to requirements. It is not a pleasant feeling. I trust I will not have to repeat it in a hurry.
‘What we need to do,’ said Tren wisely after a while, ‘is find out how this was done, and by who.’
‘Or whom,’ I put in.
Tren stared at me. ‘Is this really the time?’
‘For impeccable grammar? Always.’
He left that unanswered. After a short pause he continued: ‘Whoever it was that said we have to unravel this from Dwinal’s end was right.’
‘That was Hyarn.’
‘Then Hyarn was right. We can do nothing for them from here.’
‘All inarguable, but what does that mean? Do you happen to know where Dwinal is, right now?’ I waved an arm at the bleak expanse of bare island that stretched away before and around us. In the distance we could see the pale walls of the new Library bravely glinting through the rain, and of course there would be Lokants aplenty over there manning the whatever-it-was that accomplished the building. Would Dwinal be somewhere among them? Maybe, but probably not. She did not strike me as the type to get her hands dirty overseeing the peasants who carried out the menial labour. She would have other people to do that, while she… did something else.
‘We can probably figure it out,’ said Tren, with that appalling optimism of his.
‘Really!’ I snapped. ‘Feel free to try. But we have not covered ourselves in glory trying to work out what these people are doing ahead of time, have we? In fact, we have got it wrong at almost every turn! The sad truth is that Dwinal is a lot smarter than we are. But if you want to take another shot at her, go right ahead.’ I folded my arms and glared at poor Tren, while the cold water dripped out of my bedraggled hair and slid down my nose.
Anyone who is much acquainted with me will know one or two (or three) salient facts about my character, namely:
— I do not like being wet.
— I do not like being cold.
— I do not like being made a fool of.
Being obliged to suffer all three unfavourable states in one go did nothing desirable for my mood.
Tren, however, is used to me by now. His response to this display of irritability was to enfold me in a tight hug. Then he said: ‘Take a breath. We can do this.’
I took a breath. I cannot say I found it as revitalising to my spirits as Tren appeared to expect, but some combination of those things was calming, and I managed not to claw his eyes out. ‘All right. What is your best guess?’
‘Let’s think about what we know. First, these draykoni do not appear to be vital to Dwinal’s plans immediately, so perhaps the urgency to release them is not as great as we’ve been assuming. Agreed?’
‘I suppose.’ I cast a dubious look at the nearest of the draykoni, which was poor Pensould. I hated to see him like that. I called it slumber but it was nothing like sleep, not really. Not restful, not rejuvenating. It was draining for him, and I have no doubt it was a deeply unpleasant state.
But Tren was right. Nindrinat had recovered, and quickly, though she had been kept in that state for some time. Pensould and the others would not deteriorate too far over the course of another hour or two.
‘Next. Hyarn took a lot of Ylona’s people out here in order to… what? I don’t know, but if it were me I would want to achieve two things: interfere with the progress of building that Library, and make sure Dwinal doesn’t manage to make off with the island.’
‘Right. And those three Libraries are instrumental to the latter.’ The three Libraries were visible from where we stood, just about. Sulayn Phay loomed large behind us; the other two were more distant, but still unimaginably huge. Just looking at them made me feel inconsequential, outfaced and unpleasantly awed, so I tried not to.
‘Yes, so if I was Hyarn I would want to make sure at least one of those Libraries is unable to perform its intended purpose.’
‘He might have gone to treat with one of the other two, to talk them down.’
‘Or more simply?’
I narrowed my eyes at him. ‘Don’t test me!’
He smiled, all patience. ‘Try this. If you were Ylona, what would you be doing right now?’
‘I would be trying everything I could to take over the Lokantorship, instantly and without delay.’
‘Which she says is not achievable. If you were Dwinal, what would you do next?’
‘That depends on the status of her plans. If the other two Libraries are ready to go—’
‘—and they seem to be.’
‘They do. Then I would hasten forth to bring Sulayn Phay in line, and off we would go.’
‘So Dwinal is either: checking with the Lokantors of those other two Libraries to make sure they’re in line with her requirements and ready to go, or she is back at Sulayn Phay, preparing to depart.’
‘This does not help us much, Tren. If the latter, we are too late. In any case, how are we to intercept her at any of these points? What would we do
if we did find her?’
‘I—’
Sadly I will never know what brilliant plan Tren might have been about to advance, for he spotted something over my shoulder and stopped dead, his next words left forever unspoken. His eyes widened. ‘Oh no, is that… it is! What in the world is Ny doing?’
I whirled, just in time to see the great, dark shape of Nyden, airborne and bearing down upon us at speed.
‘Oh no, he mustn’t come here, he’ll be trapped like the others!’ I waved my arms and jumped about and generally tried my best to signal do not approach! Danger! But to no avail. Nyden flew on, unperturbed, and landed in a spray of earth about ten feet away.
‘Nyden, you prat, get out of here!’ Tren ran at him, as though he intended to shove Nyden straight off the island again.
‘I know.’ Nyden got up, slowly. He was already affected by the draining whirl of amasku, for he staggered and almost fell over again. ‘I have news.’
‘It better be vital news!’
‘It is!’ And he told us, in as few words as he could manage, about Rastivan’s latest revelations. I was so proud of him for obeying my orders I felt like kissing him. A meekly cooperative Ny! Wonders will never cease!
‘Wherever those four drayks are, they are probably responsible for this mess.’ Nyden weakly gestured a wing at the array of felled draykoni, his black hide glistening with rain. ‘Kill them, and you’ll free us.’
Us. I wanted to protest that it was too soon to be counting himself among them, but Nyden was fast succumbing. He slumped to the ground and stretched out, casually, as though preparing for a pleasant snooze. His eyes closed. ‘I left Avane with Rastivan,’ he said around a yawn. ‘Make sure she’s all right.’
I replied that of course we would check on Avane — once we had finished tracking down these mythical (and remarkably well-hidden) draykoni, doing something about the elusive Dwinal, and saving the island of Orlind, but Nyden was out cold before I had spoken more than about three words of this.
Tren and I stood for a moment, staring at Nyden’s inert (but gently breathing) form with mixed feelings.
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