Suddenly the tailor bird appeared. He whirled about them, shrilling: “Get inside, inside! A posse of men is approaching! They’re at the corner of the street!”
Seconds later Isiq found himself crouched in the cottage, the door barred and the lamp extinguished, the bird hopping ecstatically about on his shoulders, the dog still as stone beside his boots. Footsteps rang in the alley; gruff voices murmured. Isiq’s knee was in agony but he did not make a sound.
Then he felt the witch’s hand. Gently, it found his throbbing knee and remained there, cool and almost weightless. And to Isiq’s amazement the pain began to subside.
The footsteps faded, the voices trailed away. Finally a match flared in the darkness. Captain Gregory was lighting a pipe.
“Have a pull, Admiral?”
Isiq shook his head firmly.
“Relax, man, it’s only tobacco. Etherhorde greenleaf, the smuggler’s friend.”
“Do be quiet, Gregory,” said Suthinia. Isiq looked up and met her great dark eyes.
“They,” she said, “are two women who will change this world. The first is your Empress, Maisa of Arqual, the one to whom you swore allegiance long before Ott put the usurper Magad the Fifth upon the throne. We will go to her tomorrow, and together we will try to stop this idiot’s war.”
“Maisa? Maisa lives? Gods below, where is she?”
“A place no Empress should be caught dead in,” chuckled Gregory.
“The other woman,” said Suthinia, “is the one I’ve been waiting for, all these years. When she came at last I did not know her, but I know her now. She is the hope of Alifros, and the one my boy, it seems, can’t live without. I’m speaking of your daughter, Admiral. Thasha Isiq is alive.”
The tears struck faster than Gregory’s club. He choked, and sat down hard, and the witch’s arm went around his shoulders. They were arguing (husband, wife, dog) about how Suthinia had broken the news, how she might have done it better. Isiq scarcely noticed. Before his eyes the tailor bird was flitting in the darkness, Don’t cry Isiq, she’ll find you, she’ll fly home somehow, the young are very strong. He wept, and felt the call to arms within him, and the warmth of a woman’s touch, and the swish, swish of angels’ wings against his face.
On the Hunt
6 Modobrin 941
235th day from Etherhorde
The terrible choice, stay or go, haunted many in what remained of the night. For some, deciding was the whole struggle; others reached a decision but had to argue, plead, even fight with their fists to defend it. There were the needs of the Chathrand to consider, the calculations of her officers and spies, the doubt as to whether anyone who left the ship would ever see her again and the ability of a panicked Masalym to find steeds, saddles, boots. Against all of that, a mystery: the threat to the world posed by one mage and one small black sphere. When the Upper Gate of the city opened at last and the party rode out upon the still-dark plain, its composition was a surprise to just about everyone.
Lord Taliktrum was no exception. From atop the gate’s stone arch he watched them emerging: three Turachs, eight dlomic warriors, the latter on the cat-like sicunas rather than horses. Lean, swift dogs spilling about them, visibly eager for the hunt to begin. Next came the allies: Pazel and Neeps sharing one horse, Thasha and Hercol on mounts of their own. The youths looked exhausted already, as though they had never gone to sleep. Big Skip Sunderling bounced along awkwardly behind them, a sailor on horseback. The shock on his face made it clear that no one had foreseen his inclusion less than Big Skip himself.
Two pack horses, then Ibjen and Bolutu. And what was this? The sfvantskors, Pazel’s sister and her two comrades-prisoners no longer, but still under the Arqualis’ watchful gaze.
The young lord tasted bile at the sight of the next rider: Alyash. He wore a look of foul displeasure. Sandor Ott’s curious weapon, the thing called a pistol, was strapped to his leg. Beside him rode the elder tarboy, Dastu. Ott’s servants, both, mused Taliktrum. He didn’t dare leave the Chathrand, but he’s wise enough to realize that the Nilstone, even from here, could threaten his beloved Arqual. He’s forced them to go in his stead. They’ll hate him for that, if they’ve any wisdom of their own.
There were yet two more in the party, though they might easily have been overlooked. They rode on the withers of the pack animals, holding tight, facing forward: Ensyl-Taliktrum should have expected to see her among the giants, but also “Skies of fire!”
Myett. Taliktrum’s hands tightened to fists. What possible excuse? Had she been hounded out by worshippers, by vicious expectation?
An outrage, that’s what it was. Ride away with the humans, to the Pits with the clan. And he could only watch them go. The woman who had loved his aunt, and the woman who had loved him. Indeed the only such woman, apart from the mother who had died in his infancy-and the aunt herself.
They were forty feet gone, then sixty, then as far as a giant could throw a stone. Something overcame him, and he dived on his swallow-wings and flew with all his strength, needing to touch her, command her, speak some word of fury or desire.
With five yards to go he swerved away. Coward, weakling! Who was he to question Myett? On what authority? Moral, rational, the law of the clan? He was nothing, he was far less than nothing. He was an ixchel alone.
“No sign of the great Captain Rose,” grumbled Neeps. “After all his rage and noise and don’t-you-be-lates. I wonder if he meant a single word.”
Pazel answered with stuporous grunt.
“Even this morning he acted like he was getting ready to come with us,” Neeps went on. “And it didn’t seem like a lie. Maybe he couldn’t bear to leave Oggosk, in the end. Do you think she really could be his mother?”
Pazel shrugged.
“You’re not going to speak to me all the way to the mountain, are you?” said Neeps.
“Doubt it,” muttered Pazel.
They were still in darkness, though the tops of the mountains had begun to glow. The “highway” that ran through Masalym’s Inner Dominion, from the city to the mountain pass, was really no more than a wide footpath, hugging the left bank of the meandering Mai. Fog blanketed the river, snagged on the reeds where birds were chattering, spilled here and there over the path, so that the horse’s legs became stirring spoons. Already the city lay an hour behind.
“You heard what I told Marila,” said Neeps. “I said I’d stay behind. Credek, Pazel, I tried all night to convince her.”
Pazel waved a beetle from the horse’s neck. He was glad he was riding in front, where there was no need to look Neeps in the eye.
“She wouldn’t let me stay,” Neeps pleaded.
“Did you ever make her believe you wanted to?”
That shut him up. Pazel felt a twinge of guilt for not wanting to hear Neeps talk anymore. But why should he, after a whole night lying awake, suffering for both of them, furious that they’d let it happen now.
“When was it, Neeps?” he said at last, trying and failing to keep the bitterness from his voice. “That night you almost killed Thasha, while I was on Bramian?”
“Yes,” said Neeps. “That was the first time.”
“The first time. Pitfire. Were there many?”
“We tried to be careful,” said Neeps.
Pazel bit his tongue. He was thinking how easily a jab with either elbow would knock his friend to the ground.
“Those storms on the Ruling Sea,” Neeps was saying. “We really thought we were going to die. And the mutiny, the rats… and then we woke up in the ixchel’s blary pen.”
“Why didn’t you just tell me?”
“What, from in there? Shouting through the window? Or afterward, you mean? ‘Listen, mate, I’m sorry Thasha’s taken up with that grinning bastard Fulbreech, but you’ll be glad to know that I’m-’ No, we couldn’t have done that to you. And by then it was too late. Probably.”
“But Gods damn it, you’re stupid! Both of you.”
He’d spoken too loudly; Thasha’s gl
ance shamed them both into silence. For at least half a minute.
“You know what I think?” said Neeps.
“I never have yet.”
“I think it could have happened to you and Thasha.”
Half a dozen retorts occurred to Pazel instantly-and melted on his tongue, one after another. “Let’s say that were true,” he managed at last. “So what?”
“So try thanking your stars,” said Neeps, “instead of going on like Mother Modesty about the two of us.”
This time the silence lasted a good mile as they trotted down the dusty trail, past the fisherfolk’s mud huts, the trees with their limbs dangling low over the water. Pazel thought he smelled lemon trees. But he had yet to see a lemon or anything like it in the South.
“Neeps,” he said at last, “I’m sorry. You’re right.”
After a moment, Neeps said, “So are you.”
“What did you say to Marila, just before we left the ship? When you took her hand and ran off toward the Silver Stair?”
“You mean Thasha hasn’t told you?”
“Told me what?”
Neeps actually managed a laugh. “Pazel, Marila and I had already talked right through the blary night. We didn’t leave the stateroom to talk. We went straight to Captain Rose and asked him to marry us. And he did.”
An hour later the whole western range was bathed in sunlight. There were vineyards here, and pear trees, and herds of sheep and goats and birthigs that scattered at their approach. Lamps passed from window to window in the waking farmhouses. Dogs appeared out of nowhere, challenged the hunting dogs briefly, changed their minds. The land was as peaceful as Masalym had been chaotic.
Suddenly Cayer Vispek cried out a warning: dust clouds behind them, and faintly, the pounding of hooves. Someone was giving chase.
The soldiers raised spears and halberds. Pazel’s hand went instinctively to the sword at his belt, though he knew nothing about fighting on horseback. Ensyl stood up on her horse and studied the road through the monocular scope that had belonged to her dead mistress. “It is just one rider,” she said. “A dlomu, coming fast.” Then she lowered the scope and looked at them, amazed. “It’s Counselor Vadu,” she said.
He was dressed in the same fine armor he had worn at the welcome ceremony, the gold breastplate gleaming in the early sun. He rode with a great battle-axe lashed sidelong across his back, and on his belt hung the shattered Plazic Blade. He galloped right up to the travelers, then reined in his horse.
“If you think to turn us back,” said Hercol by way of greeting, “you have made a worthless trip. Unless it be that the sorcerer is found.”
Vadu glared at Hercol as he caught his breath. “The mage is not found,” he said at last, “but the city is calming under Olik’s stewardship. And I… I will not sit and wait for death at the hands of the White Raven.”
“She will forgive nothing short of the Nilstone’s return,” said Bolutu, “and that you cannot provide. We are not setting out to wrest the Stone from one sorcerer only to hand it over to his ally. Go your own way, Vadu. Or ride with us to Garal Crossing, and then turn east on the Coast Road and follow the Issar into exile. But do not seek to thwart our mission.”
The soldiers began to grumble ominously: whatever the chaos in Masalym, Vadu had been their commander for years, and now this strange dlomu, who had come on the ship with the mutant tol-chenni, was trying to dismiss him like a page.
“I say he’s more than just welcome,” said one sicuna-rider. “I say that if anyone’s to lead this expedition, it’s Counselor Vadu.”
The other soldiers shouted, “Hear, hear! Vadu!”
A sword whistled from its sheath. Hercol raised Ildraquin before him, sidelong, and the men stopped their cheering at the sight of the black blade. “Olik entrusted this mission to me,” said Hercol, “and my oath binds me to the cause as well. I cannot follow this man, who ordered regicide, and helped Arunis gain the Nilstone to begin with.”
Everyone went sharply rigid. The Turachs nudged their mounts away from the dlomu; the sfvantskors watched the others like wolves tensed to spring. But the dlomic soldiers were all looking at Vadu’s Plazic Knife, still sheathed upon his belt. “You can’t fight him,” muttered one. “Don’t try, if this mission means anything to you at all.”
“Counselor,” said Hercol, “will you depart in peace?”
Vadu’s face contorted. His head began to bob, more violently than Pazel had ever seen, and suddenly he realized that it was not a mere habit but an affliction, involuntary, perhaps even painful. The counselor’s eyes filled with rage; his limbs shook, and his hand went slowly to the Plazic Blade. Muscles straining, he drew the blade a fraction of an inch from its sheath. The sicunas crouched, hissing, and the horses of several warriors bolted in fear, deaf to their riders’ cries. Pazel gasped and clutched at his chest. That poisonous feeling. That black energy that poured like heat from the body of the demonic reptile, the eguar: it was there, alive in Vadu’s blade. He could almost hear the creature’s agonizing language, which his Gift had forced him to learn.
With a smooth motion Hercol dismounted, never lowering Ildraquin, and walked toward Vadu’s prancing steed. The counselor drew his weapon fully, and Pazel saw that it was no more than a stump upon the hilt. But was there something else there? A pale ghost of a knife, maybe, where the old blade had been?
“I can kill you with a word,” snarled Vadu, his head bobbing, snapping, his face twitching like an addict deprived of his deathsmoke.
Hercol stood at his knee. Slowly he lowered Ildraquin toward the man-and then, with blinding speed, turned the blade about and offered its hilt to the counselor.
“No!” shouted the youths together. But it was done: Vadu snatched the sword from Hercol with his free hand. And cried aloud.
It was a different sort of cry: not tortured, but rather the cry of one suddenly released from torture. He sheathed the ghostly knife and took his hand from the hilt. Then he pressed the blade of Ildraquin to his forehead and held it there, eyes closed. Slowly his jerking and twitching ceased. The sword slipped from his grasp, and Hercol caught it as it fell.
Vadu looked down at him, and his face was serene, almost aglow, like the face of one clinging to a marvelous dream. But even as they watched him the glow faded, and something of his strained, proud look came back to him.
“Mercy of the stars,” he said. “I was rid of it. For a moment I was free. That is a sword from Kingdom Dafvniana.”
Hercol polished the blade on his arm. “The smiths who made her named her Ildraquin, ‘Earthblood,’ for it is said that she was forged in a cavern deep in the heart of the world. But King Bectur, delivered from enchantment by her touch, called her Curse-Cleaver, and that name too is well deserved.”
“My curse is too strong, however,” said Vadu. “The sword cannot free me from the curse of my own Plazic Blade-but time will, if only I can remain alive. Listen to me, before the knife seals my tongue again! The Blades have made monsters of us, and a nightmare of Bali Adro. Through all my life I’ve watched them poison us with power. Olik told you that they are rotting away. Did he tell you that we who carry them rejoice in our hearts? For we are slaves to them, though they make us masters of other men. They whisper to our savage minds, even as they break our bodies. What happens to the Blades, you see, happens also to those who carry them. When they wither, we scream in pain. When they shatter, we die. Many have died this way already: my commander in Orbilesc swept an army of Thuls over a cliff with a sweep of his arm, and we all heard the knife break, and he fell down dead. That is how the knife came to me-a last, loathsome inch. I am a small man to own such a thing, or be owned by it. But I mean to survive it. When only the hilt remains, I shall be able to toss it away. Until then I must resist the urge to use it, for any but the smallest deeds.”
“Better no deeds at all,” said Cayer Vispek. “That is a devil’s tool.”
Vadu’s eyes flashed at the elder sfvantskor. But there was struggle in th
em still, and when they turned to Hercol they were beseeching.
“Pazel,” said Neda in Mzithrini, “tell the Tholjassan to drive this man away. He will bring us all to grief.”
“I can see by the woman’s face what she wishes,” said Vadu. “Do not send me off! I tell you I mean to survive, but there is more: I wish to see my people, my country, survive. Do you understand what I have witnessed, what I have done? And in another year or two the horror must end, for all the Blades will have melted. Our insanity will lift, and Bali Adro can start to heal the world it has profaned. I live for that day. I cannot bear to see the harm renewed by something even worse. I rode out to help, not hinder you.”
Hercol studied him carefully. “Then ride, and be welcome,” he said at last, “but guard your soul, man of Masalym. It is not free yet.”
As the track moved away from the river it grew into something like a proper road, running between fields neatly laid out, and sturdy brick farmhouses with smoke rising from their chimneys. They rode faster here; the smallest of the hunting dogs had to be picked up and carried. At midday they did not pause for a meal but ate riding; Olik had advised them to cross the open farmland as swiftly as possible, and to rest where the track entered the riverbank forest called the Ragwood, where the trees would hide them. Pazel found it hard to imagine anyone watching from the Chalice of the Mai. But there were nearer peaks and, for all he knew, villages scattered among them, watching the curious procession along the valley floor.
In the hottest hour of the day they rode through a plain of tall red grass, dotted by great solitary trees and swarming with a kind of hopping insect that rose in clouds at their approach with a sound like sizzling meat. The horses shied and the sicunas growled. Pazel did not understand their distress until one of the insects landed on his arm. It jumped away instantly, but as it did so he felt a shock, like the kind the ironwork on the Chathrand could give you during an electrical storm.
“Chuun-crickets,” said Bolutu. “We have them in Istolym as well. By autumn there will be millions, and they will have sucked all the sap from the chuun-grass, and those little shocks you feel will set it all ablaze.”
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