by Ian Irvine
At the last bow, the gathering gave them a ragged cheer and surged towards the net.
Flydd said, ‘We’re done,’ and Chissmoul turned away, out over the silent city, heading east.
‘You old bastard,’ said Nish, and shook his hand. ‘I would never have thought of that, much less attempted it, yet you’ve pulled it off.’
‘And the rest is up to you, Deliverer.’
TWENTY-SIX
On the journey to Roros they planned to keep to uninhabited places, camping in uplands or on hilltops where there was not so much as a cottage in sight, though Flydd was not afraid of the people of this land. Even the most desperate troublemakers would have kept well clear of the scarred and battle-hardened militia.
‘It’s best if we disappear for a while,’ he said to Nish the following night, when they were sitting around the camp fire after everyone else had gone to their bedrolls. ‘We’ve created a sensation, and if nothing more is seen of us for a while, the rumours will spread more strongly than if we popped into every town. Let the authorities worry about what we’re going to do next, and the people wonder, and our strength and cunning will grow with each telling.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ said Nish limply, for he was so worn out that he’d had trouble sleeping, day or night.
‘Besides, we’ve been pushed beyond endurance since Jal-Nish attacked Mistmurk Mountain six weeks ago, and we deserve a holiday. And now, old friend, the payoff.’
Flydd levered the bung out of one of his flagons, sniffed deeply, then poured a healthy red-gold measure of liqueur into a pair of the etched glass goblets he’d lifted from the pantry. Handing one to Nish, he said, ‘Now tell me this doesn’t taste better than it would from a mouldy wineskin.’
Nish twirled his goblet, admiring the way the light twinkled off the delicately etched surfaces, as fine as silver filigree. ‘There’s no comparison, but I still wouldn’t risk burning to death for the privilege.’
He took a tentative sniff and the bouquet rushed up his nose, burning deliciously, enchantingly. He sipped and it was even better. Tears formed in his eyes; it reminded him of older, happier times and he felt an urge to reminisce.
‘It’s a good while since we were on the road together, Xervish. Do you remember the last time we shared a cup of wine?’
‘I do, though the memory is a trifle hazy.’
Nish snorted.
‘And not because of the quantity I drank, though I recall you found it hard to stand up afterwards.’ Flydd chuckled. ‘It was on the little bench outside my amber-wood cabin on Mistmurk Mountain, after you came out of the swamp to break my lonely nine-year exile.’
‘That was a good day,’ said Nish dreamily.
‘It was a very good day.’ Flydd took another sip. ‘As it happens, my recollections of the time immediately before renewal are hazy, though my older memories are as clear as this goblet. Do you remember when we drank together before that?’
Nish’s smile faded. ‘I’ll never forget a minute of that terrible day. It was ten and a half years ago in Ashmode, on the shores of the Dry Sea, which was, even then, starting to fill. We were having a victory banquet – at least, the best that could be managed with the rations we had. The war had been won and we’d made an honourable peace with the lyrinx, who had turned out to be rather like us, inside, despite their fierce outer appearance.’
‘Very like,’ said Flydd. ‘We all want the same things, when you get down to it.’
‘After a hundred and fifty years the war was finally over, and I think we all felt numb. We couldn’t believe that we were going to have peace at last. We were sitting around a long table in the town square, drinking that dreadful wine and talking about our futures.’
‘Our futures.’ Flydd raised his glass as if toasting the man he’d been back then, or the memory of him.
‘As I remember it, you were planning to write the true Histories of the war, and after that you were talking about a cottage and a little garden. We found that highly amusing,’ Nish snorted.
‘It might seem so, if you were in your cups,’ Flydd sniffed.
‘The great Scrutator Flydd, one of the heroes of the war, living in a cottage and growing flowers? We couldn’t come to terms with that, either.’
‘You always did lack for vision,’ Flydd said with a touch of the asperity of old. ‘When times change, a man must change with them and, if you recall, all of us who had fought so hard during the war were overthrown at the end of it, by generals greedy for power.’
‘They didn’t hold it long,’ said Nish quietly. ‘We talked about our hopes and dreams for the future that day. Did any of us achieve them?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Flydd. ‘Though I did write my Histories, in the lonely years at the top of Mistmurk, and I think they were the finest of all my works.’
‘What works? I didn’t know you had any.’
‘I’ve always kept my own personal Histories. And up on Mistmurk Mountain I wrote the tale of the times in five journals. I kept them under my bed, in an amber-wood box for luck, and in my exile I often imagined the sensation they would cause when I finally brought them forth, because I didn’t hold back. Unsuspected traitors would have been revealed, and several great names ruined. Alas, no one has read them but me, nor ever will. Mistmurk was smashed to bits by the fall of Jal-Nish’s sky-palace, and my journals would have been destroyed.’
‘I dare say,’ said Nish, distracted by that memory, though it was hazy due to his being in Vivimord’s thrall at the time.
The embers settled with a flurry of sparks. Flydd tossed more wood on, for their camp was at a high altitude and the night was chilly. ‘Thinking back to the banquet, I distinctly remember Irisis telling us about her dreams and hopes. She kept saying that her destiny was to die –’
Nish choked and Flydd gripped him by the shoulder. ‘Drink up lad, and remember. It does no good to block out the past, no matter how terrible it is. It’s far better to relive it, when you’re ready, and keep doing so until its horrors no longer have any power over you.’
Nish said nothing. He couldn’t speak. He did not want to remember, but neither was he willing to try and forget.
Flydd dropped his hand and continued. ‘Ah, that was one of the very worst days of my long life – no, it was the worst. But Nish, as I recall the banquet that day, you never talked about your dreams, nor what you wanted for the future.’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘I’m not sure. Perhaps I had a premonition of what was to come; perhaps I was afraid to jinx the future.’
‘Or maybe you were just struck dumb, that so beautiful, brave and brilliant a woman as Irisis should want an ugly little coot like you,’ Flydd chuckled.
Nish managed a feeble smile. ‘I wouldn’t have put it quite so plainly, but yes, I’m sure there was an element of that in it.’
‘I never told you this before, because she only talked about it when she’d had more wine than was good for her, and swore me to secrecy afterwards, though after all this time I think you’re entitled to be told. I don’t know where she got the idea, but Irisis had come to believe that she had a destiny that could only be fulfilled after her death.’
Nish reeled. ‘I hope you’re not saying that she wanted to die? That she had a death wish?’
‘Don’t be absurd, of course she didn’t. She wanted to live as much as any of us, and she had more to live for than most.’
‘Then what are you saying?’
‘That she believed her death was going to change the future.’
‘It has,’ said Nish. ‘If she hadn’t died, if we’d escaped that day, I would never have sworn to overthrow Father. And I wouldn’t have spent ten years in Mazurhize.’
‘That’s not what she meant. Irisis felt that, despite all she had to live for, her destiny required her to die … yet that would not be the end of it.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Nish.
‘Neither do I, tho
ugh I’ve thought about it many times. I’m sure that’s why she never expected to survive the war. You must have heard her say so.’
‘Many times,’ said Nish, feeling tears forming in his eyes, ‘until I begged her not to mention it again. Let’s not talk about this any more, Xervish; I haven’t the heart for it.’ He knocked back the rest of his goblet and surreptitiously wiped his eyes. ‘And stop hogging the liqueur, you greedy old bugger.’
‘I’ve taken renewal; I’m no longer considered old,’ Flydd said in superior tones, and poured Nish a trifling measure.
‘Fill it up, damn you. I’m going to get so roaringly drunk that I won’t remember a thing.’
Flydd gave him a little more. ‘I don’t think that will help, really I don’t.’
‘When I want your advice I’ll ask for it. You used to be an old soak, anyway, you hypocrite – a veritable piss-bucket.’
‘And still am, when I can get drink of quality,’ Flydd retorted, ‘since I need to numb my renewed internal organs. I have no problem with you getting drunk, not that it ever helps. But not yet.’
‘Why not?’ Nish said surlily.
‘We have to talk about your campaign, and I can’t do that on an air-sled with forty other people listening. It’s got to be now.’
‘We should involve Flangers at least. And Chissmoul.’
‘Later, once you and I have worked out what to do and how to do it.’
‘Don’t you trust them?’
‘It’s not a matter of trust. The more people know your secrets, the sooner the enemy will get to hear of them.’
Nish knew he was right; he was just arguing for the sake of it, and, even though he’d slept on the air-sled for most of that day’s shuddering flight, he was exhausted in mind and body. ‘Very well. Let’s talk so I can go to bed.’
Flydd glanced at the sleeping militia, who were some distance away, and lowered his voice. ‘There are several ways you could begin the overthrow of the empire. You might set up a government-in-exile in a friendly city, say, Roros, and gradually extend your power.’
‘I could.’ Nish leaned backwards. The stars made a vast pinwheel against the black velvet of the night sky, as bright as he had ever seen them, though many of the constellations were different from those of the southern skies under which he had spent most of his life. ‘But I would soon be besieged from all sides and no longer in control of my own destiny. That’s no way to bring down an empire.’
‘To take an empire,’ said Flydd pointedly. ‘Bring it down and you create a power vacuum, which all the scum on Santhenar will scramble to fill. But I agree, so let’s put that plan aside.’
‘I’m minded to foster a series of small rebellions as I march up the coast, speaking to as many gatherings as I can and gathering arms and men, then take cities as I go and head for the centre of Father’s empire.’
‘The way Vivimord, when he was known as Monkshart, planned to make you into the Deliverer?’
‘Well, yes,’ said Nish. ‘Do I gather that you don’t think much of the idea?’
‘It’s the strategy your father would expect you to follow.’
‘Oh!’
‘Therefore, even in his absence, and Klarm’s, there will be plans to combat such a campaign. The art of war lies in being unpredictable, Nish, and that’s how you’ve gained all your successes so far, both on the Range of Ruin and in Taranta. But if the God-Emperor’s seneschals and generals guess what you’re going to do, and how you’ll do it, his mighty war machine will be waiting to crush you as soon as you appear.’
‘He doesn’t know where I’m going to appear,’ Nish said mulishly.
‘He has wisp-watchers and loop-listeners in each town and village. Each town has scriers and spies, and informers are everywhere. Once you start making speeches and raising an army, Gatherer will know within hours.’
‘But Klarm has Gatherer, and he’s in the shadow realm.’
‘He could have returned by now. He could even be in Morrelune. Even if he isn’t, since watchers and scriers can communicate via Gatherer, Klarm may be able to give them orders the same way.’
‘He couldn’t communicate with his troops on the other side of the Range of Ruin,’ said Nish, ‘which means that the reach of Gatherer is limited.’
‘It’s better to overestimate the power of the tears than underestimate them.’
‘I quite agree, though last time Father didn’t take me seriously. He let me win my first battle, near Guffeons, even though it cost him an army.’ The bitterness rose up Nish’s throat like vomit. ‘And he did it just so he could later have the pleasure of telling me so – to undermine me and rob me of the satisfaction of my victory against the odds. He’s done it to me all my life, ever since I was a little kid.’
‘He might have been lying,’ said Flydd.
‘What?’ Nish realised that he was slurring his words a little. He put the goblet down and concentrated.
‘What if that victory was yours, and your father was lying because he couldn’t bear to admit the truth – that you had beaten him?’
It would have been a blinding revelation if it could possibly have been true. ‘But I’ve never beaten him,’ Nish said dully.
‘You did on the Range of Ruin. Besides, it’s Klarm we’ve got to deal with and he doesn’t play games. If you threaten the empire he’ll crush you. He’s got to, and quickly, so he can turn his attention to Stilkeen.’
‘Klarm didn’t do so well at Blisterbone,’ said Nish.
‘Because he had been ordered to take you alive if at all possible, and that constrained him severely. But any direct threat to the empire has to override that order, and if he can’t take you, he’ll have you killed, anonymously. What could be easier than an assassin’s arrow when you’re exhorting the masses to rise and join you? Or a poisoned cup; or a knife in the back from the crowd? If Klarm decides that you must be killed for the good of the empire, no amount of vigilance can stop him.’
‘If your purpose is to frustrate me and undermine every plan I put forward,’ Nish said irritably, ‘you’re succeeding. What would you do?’
‘I don’t know. I just wanted to get you thinking. Once we reach Roros, we’ve got to have a solid plan and be ready to put it into instant action.’
‘When you’ve thought of one, please let me know.’ Nish drained his goblet and set it upside down beside the cooking ware.
‘I’m going to bed.’
‘What’s the matter with it now?’ said Nish as the air-sled began to shake violently.
‘How would I know?’ snapped Chissmoul. ‘I’m a pilot, not a mechanician. I’ll have to go down again.’
It was their third morning since the attack on Taranta and the air-sled had been giving trouble from the moment they’d boarded it. She had landed the craft twice already, and crawled through the hole to fiddle with the mechanism inside, but it hadn’t made any difference.
‘Is it far to Roros?’ said Flangers carefully, for she had been touchy ever since leaving Taranta.
They were flying along the western side of the mountains of Crandor, over desert lands where there was little chance of being seen, but not even Flydd was familiar with these parts and they did not have a map.
‘I haven’t got a clue!’ She banked the air-sled, scanning the range for a suitable landing place.
‘It doesn’t look very promising,’ said Nish to Flydd.
‘The country or our journey?’
‘Either. I’d hate to be marooned here.’
‘It would certainly spoil your plans,’ Flydd said laconically as the air-sled stuttered towards a rock-littered river bed, which was as dry as every other river they had seen in the past day.
Below them an upland desert stretched in every direction as far as Nish could see, a hilly, eroded land whose stony ground was scattered with withered grey shrubs. Being in the rain shadow of the great mountains of Crandor it did not rain here from one year to the next and, as far as Nish could tell, the recent flooding
of the Sea of Perion had made no difference to the climate.
In summer it would bake, yet now, at the beginning of spring, the nights were decidedly chilly, and it would take hours to gather enough spindly bushes for a decent fire.
Chissmoul guided the craft to a skidding landing on the sand between the rocks, but it kept sliding and thumped up onto a rounded boulder before screeching to a stop, canted to the left. Several of the injured slid forwards on their stretchers and ended up jammed together behind Chissmoul’s seat.
‘Can I help you with anything?’ Flangers said, polite as ever.
‘Go away!’ snarled Chissmoul.
He bit his lip, turned aside and jumped onto the sand. The militia carried the stretchers off and lay down in the sun. They seemed to have an infinite appetite for sleep and Nish could not blame them.
‘Let’s go for a walk,’ said Flydd. ‘You too, Flangers.’
They strolled down the river bed, the grey sand squeaking underfoot.
‘What’s the matter with her?’ said Flangers. ‘I’d have thought Chissmoul would be happy, since she’s flying again, but she’s more cranky every day.’
‘She loves flying; it’s her life and her joy,’ said Flydd. ‘But she’s afraid the air-sled will break down at any minute and that will be the end of flight for her, forever.’
‘I dare say you’re right,’ Flangers said morosely. ‘There’s nothing we can do about it, then.’
‘And maybe she feels that she’s letting us down,’ said Nish. ‘She knows how urgent it is that we get to Roros, and if the air-sled fails she might blame herself.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ said Flangers. ‘It was having problems even when Klarm was using it.’
‘But she’s the pilot. She can’t not feel responsible if her craft lets us down.’
TWENTY-SEVEN