by Holly Lisle
In the morning, when Gyels woke them, everyone’s belongings were scattered through the little copse, and their food was gone.
They stared at each other, and every face wore the same suspicious expression.
Gyels was the first to speak. He said, “I didn’t make this mess. I left camp last night because I couldn’t sleep, and I’ve spent the night trailing Thirk; I only just returned this morning. At least I bring good news with me. Thirk is very near.”
“You don’t look like a man who walked all night,” Faia told him. “You don’t look tired at all.”
“I don’t need as much sleep as you… you sluggards.” He sniffed and his nostrils pinched tight.
Which was true, Faia thought. Gyels had stayed in the lead the entire time, breaking trail under dreadful conditions, and although she had seen him look bored plenty of times, she had never seen him look completely worn out.
“Perhaps Thirk doubled back to steal our food,” Delmuirie said.
Bytoris looked at him as if he were insane. “He’s almost to Bonton already. He has the magical chalice. Why in the names of all the mad gods would he troop back into the mountains to steal our sorry dried fish and hardbread?”
Delmuirie shrugged. “Why, if he has something magical, would he walk through the mountains instead of flying?”
That was a good point, Faia thought. Their mountain trek had been no pleasure stroll. If she’d had her magic, they would have flown at the very least. Thirk was a saje, and knew how to transport. Why had he not done so?
Gyels said, “No doubt an animal got into the packs while you people slept.”
Faia had been looking over the ground beneath the trees where the packs had been. She found prints in the soft earth—but they weren’t animal prints. They came from a human. She rested her foot lightly beside the clearest of the marks, and found that it was somewhat longer than her foot, but nearly as narrow. And the boot had a sharply pointed toe and a rounded heel.
She said nothing. Instead, she looked at the boots Bytoris, Gyels, and Delmuirie wore. Bytoris’s boots were round-toed. So were Gyels’s. And Edrouss Delmuirie wore odd square-toed boots with thick, black soles carved in geometric designs.
“Perhaps it is the person I’ve felt following us,” she said.
Gyels looked at her and rolled his eyes. “I told you, no one is following us.” He glanced at the ground beneath another of the trees where a pack had hung and said, “Night boles. Their prints are everywhere.”
Faia started to dispute him and stopped. The hair stood on her arms and her gut tightened. Liar! she thought. But what did he have to gain with such a lie? His insistence on a point she could plainly see was untrue meant something. All she needed to do was figure out what. Why would it matter to him that everyone thought an animal raided their packs instead of a man? Why would he deny so vehemently even the suggestion that someone might be following them? Was that important? It was frightening, of course… but was it important? And if so… why? She held her peace, deciding she would watch Gyels, as she watched Bytoris and Delmuirie, until something began to make sense to her.
Chapter 20
THE rolling hills and scattered groves of the countryside they reached two days later were lovely; as Faia waded through knee-deep grass full of day-blooming fox-roses and towering Maraid-flowers, she was overwhelmed with memories of the hills where she’d grown up. She felt that at last she’d come home. She breathed cool air redolent of crushed grass and sweet sage, and heard the bleating of sheep in a far pasture, and her heart ached.
The four travelers crested a hill, and from the ridge Faia saw gaudy flags flapping in the distance from the top of a grey stone wall. She guessed the great city—for she could see Bonton was that—at little more than an hour’s walk. Her first thought was, There will be food in Bonton, thank the Lady—and someplace to bathe.
Her second was, I wish Kirtha were here. She’d love the flowering meadows, and the sweet, cool air. So different from humid Omwimmee Trade near the sea.
“Bonton,” Bytoris said. He smiled, and when he did, Faia realized how long it had been since she’d seen a smile on his face.
Delmuirie studied the huge walled city and stopped. “It was nothing but cow pastures and mud huts… before,” he whispered. “Truly, is that Bonton?”
“The greatest city in the world,” Bytoris said.
“Well could I believe that, seeing it before me now.”
Gyels said, “It is sad that we were unable to capture Thirk before he reached the city. Once inside, he will have little difficulty hiding from us… he may elude us for a very long time.”
Faia waited. There was, she was certain, more to what Gyels intended to say.
He didn’t disappoint her. “I am certain Bytoris Caligro will have to return to his work, now that he has come home. And Edrouss Delmuirie will need to find a place for himself, and some way to provide himself with food and shelter.” He clucked his tongue. “Which will leave you and me to catch Thirk. There are people in the city who… owe me debts. We will be able to find lodging and food without difficulty, you and I.”
Both Bytoris and Edrouss turned and studied Gyels.
“I had thought to continue the search for the man,” Bytoris said. “I would not willingly give over such a vital quest.”
Delmuirie nodded. “I did not come to Bonton to find a job,” he said. “I came to find a thief and stop a madman. Once I have done what I came for, I will worry about other things.”
“But where will you stay? How will you live?” Gyels asked. His smile was confident—and now Faia saw what his aim had been. She wondered if, all along, Gyels had been keeping them back so that Thirk would be able to maintain his lead. He intended to discard both men and be alone with her.
His tone infuriated Faia.
Evidently, however, she wasn’t the only one put out by Gyels’s assumptions. Bytoris said, “I have a large house in the city, with plenty of rooms. My newfound sister will have a place to stay and food to eat.”
Faia looked at him, and tried to put her hopes and her prayers in her eyes. “What about Edrouss?” she asked.
Bytoris’s lips thinned and his eyes narrowed for an instant. Then he said, “By all means, Delmuirie will stay with us, too.” Then, with a cold little bow, he added, “Even you, Gyels, are welcomed beneath my roof, should you desire to help us continue our hunt for Thirk Huddsonne and the chalice—though of course we will no longer need your tracking skills.”
The tone in his voice told Faia under no circumstances did he expect Gyels to accept his offer.
The next instant, Faia decided Bytoris should have ignored good form, for Gyels smiled and said, “Well, well—both invited and welcomed into your home. In truth, I am honored; I will carry your offer and promise close to my heart.” But then he shook his head sadly, and she breathed a quick sigh of relief. “Nonetheless, there are in Bonton those who value my company, and who await my arrival with some eagerness. I suspect I should first seek them out, to see if they would help me.”
“Help you to find Thirk?” Bytoris looked surprised.
“That is what we have been doing all this time, isn’t it?”
Bytoris nodded his head stiffly and turned his back on Gyels, whose smile became at once both self-satisfied and sly. Bytoris pointed out across the meadows before them. “Beyond that next little hill, we’ll cross the road. Be wary near it—the Wen’s trees, in these past few months, have moved from the jungle to the roadside, and now hide within the normal trees that line both sides of it.”
“The trees—moved?” Delmuirie asked He looked from Bytoris to Faia, and his expression indicated he was certain they’d all gone mad. “Walked? Oh, come now. Surely not.”
“Lurched along on their roots like giant fat spiders,” Bytoris said “I saw them do it—watched two of them moving toward the city while I stood on the top of the wall.” He frowned at the horizon and said “Ugliest gods-forsaken things I ever saw.”
/> Delmuirie looked last at Faia, and leaned close, and said, “You don’t believe this, do you? It can’t be real.”
Faia said, “The Keyu are magical trees. In the last few months, they’ve begun to walk—the survivors who traveled to Omwimmee Trade told stories of the trees hiding by the roadside and snatching up any who weren’t quick enough. Those trees are both real and deadly.”
“Trees,” Delmuirie muttered. “Walking trees.” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his breeches, and sighed. “I have never seen such a thing.”
“You’re about to,” Bytoris said. “Be careful you don’t die of the excitement.”
The travelers stopped just short of the trees lining the road. A dreadful stench assaulted them—the stink of meat spoiling in the sun, of death. Faia saw the Keyu waiting among the nonmagical trees, squat and twisted and leprous-looking, hunkered down on their insect-leg roots with their fat, slimy white palps trailing along the ground. She shuddered, remembering her first encounter with those trees, deep in the Wen jungles that bore them. They’d been bad enough when they couldn’t walk.
“How are we going to get around them?” she asked. “They’re lurking much closer together than I would have supposed.”
“Gods, those are ugly trees,” Delmuirie whispered “And they reach out and grab at you as you go past them?”
Faia nodded. “And then their trunks split, and they drag you into the hollow middle—” She stopped and closed her eyes; the memory of being caught in the maw of a Keyu, of being touched and bored into by silky, sticky threads, was suddenly fresh and real again. And now that none of them had magic, she didn’t see how they could hope to pass.
When she opened her eyes, she saw Bytoris frowning at the Keyu.
“What is it?”
“You’ve seen them before, haven’t you?”
She nodded. “Closely.”
Bytoris pointed. “Look at them. They aren’t twitching the way they usually do.”
Faia studied the trees, and realized that, indeed, they were as still as normal trees. Puzzled, she looked back to Bytoris.
He picked up a rock and hefted it thoughtfully from one hand to another. Abruptly, he pitched it at one of the Keyu. It struck directly on the palp—and sunk in. The wound oozed gelatinous grey slime, and then, with a moist, sucking sound, the palp he hit fell off.
“Ugh!” Delmuirie muttered. “Disgusting.”
“They’ve… they’ve rotted,” Faia whispered.
None of the palps so much as jerked. Faia, bewildered, took wolfshot from the bag at her belt, tucked it into her sling, and hurled it at a different palp, on a different Keyu. The jagged shot bored in one side of the growth and out the other, and more of the grey slime spurted from both holes. That palp, too, ripped free and flopped to the ground with a sickening squelch.
“I think the Keyu are dead,” Bytoris said.
“Couldn’t happen to nicer trees,” she told him, though she didn’t dare to believe he was right.
She and her brother edged closer to the Keyu. Her heart pounded in her throat—she was just waiting to discover that it was a trick, and feel again the moist, sticky tendrils as they wrapped around her and dragged her toward a waiting, gaping maw. The smell of death grew stronger, and so did Faia’s fear. Delmuirie walked along beside them, staring from them to the unmoving trees, until at last he gave an exasperated snort, and trotted up to the nearest one, borrowed sword drawn. He whacked off its palps, then strolled across the road to the other side, where he turned and bowed.
“I would guess they’re dead,” Faia said.
Bytoris gave a dry chuckle. “You might be right, mightn’t you? Though I find myself wishing that one, at least, had been alive—to swallow him.” He nodded toward Delmuirie. “Arrogant bastard.”
Gyels strode forward. Faia put a hand on Bytoris’s arm, and both of them hung back. When Gyels was out of earshot, Faia said, “I know you don’t like Edrouss. But thank you for making room for him as well as me; the more I have seen of Gyels these past few days, the more I feel we are at common cause against him.”
“You’re welcome. There are few things about that hunter that I like.”
They looked over to see Gyels walking past Delmuirie, hurrying toward the walled city—while Delmuirie stood transfixed, with his mouth gaping idiotically wide. Faia realized he hadn’t moved since he turned and bowed He stared at the tree—and suddenly an eerie, wordless keening noise tore from his throat; it brought the hairs on Faia’s neck straight up.
“Uh-oh,” she whispered. These Keyu were dead—dead. They had to be. She wanted them to be. But perhaps they were not as dead as they seemed. Perhaps Delmuirie was under the spell of some new form of their magic, some clever trap. She ran between the gauntlet of trees, keeping as far from any Keyu as she could manage, while her pulse roared in her ears and her breath came in short, sharp gasps. The trees didn’t move, didn’t grab her, didn’t pull her in. They stayed dead, and she reached the far side of the road in safety, and turned to see what it was Delmuirie stared at.
When she saw, she turned away.
The tree he was looking at had fed well before it died; its maw gaped partway open, with the remains of a victim blocking the mouth and preventing it from closing. Inside, the bloated bodies of the Keyu’s prey—men, women, and children—hung tangled in its silky webs. Hung and rotted—one it had captured recently had died still reaching for the freedom of light and air. The stench around the tree was unbearable, and Faia shoved her erda against her face and drew fresher air through the coarse felt.
“Get away from here,” she said. “You can’t do anything now.”
Delmuirie was frozen—pale and shaking, he couldn’t move. “You were telling the truth,” he said.
“Of course I was telling the truth, you idiot.” Faia grabbed his arm and dragged him after her, across what had once been a crop field—though now it was parched and overgrown with weeds. No doubt it had been neglected since the arrival of the Keyu. She heard Bytoris running in her wake.
She looked back just as he caught up with her; she saw fear in his eyes—but fresh fear, of a present danger. She stared at the Keyu behind her, but they stayed dead. “What—” she started to ask, but Bytoris merely shook his head and pointed upward.
“Run!” he croaked. “Find cover.”
Delmuirie looked where Bytoris pointed and gasped—air hissed between his teeth. He lunged at Faia, grabbed her around the waist, and knocked her into a tangle of weeds and deep grass behind a small hillock. She pummeled him and shrieked, “You bas—” but he clamped one hand over her mouth and whispered, “Quiet, or we’re dead.”
He pointed, keeping his movements small, close, and careful. She followed the direction he indicated, and quit fighting.
“I thought you said they were gone,” he whispered, and then he grew silent.
Faia got the chance to look up. High overhead, but dropping fast, monsters arrived on brilliantly colored wings. The air was suddenly full of leathery beating, of roars and rough deep bellows. Creatures from nightmare dropped out of the sky, screeching and thundering, bent on attacking the city. Faia saw Bytoris leap into tall grass nearby, and prayed that the monsters had not seen him.
The beasts were huge, lean, and muscular; their hides sparkled as if they’d been formed of gems—and indeed, the monsters came in every imaginable gemstone color, and a few besides: ruby red tipped in black, glittering emerald green, deep violet, striped orange and copper, richest sapphire blue, sun-bright yellow tipped out in emerald green, and more. But their eyes were stony, sparkling black, and their ivory teeth and adamantine claws were long and sharp.
The warriors on the wall fought back with a hailstorm of arrows, bolts, and fire, and a few of the monsters fell screaming into the moat or onto the embankment—Faia could feel the earth shake each time one hit—but the monsters had the advantage of flight and ferocity. They would not be turned. They snapped up and tore apart all the warriors they could
catch, and seemed to revel in the screams and sobs of the dying. They chased after the wall defenders, bellowing as they flew mere handbreadths above the parapet; they swept bowmen from the wall with gutting slashes of their taloned forelegs, or picked them up and dropped them from great height to watch them spatter on the rock below. They dove and dipped and soared, beautiful and terrible beyond anything Faia had ever imagined. Though they had flattered themselves in their artwork, she knew what they were—she felt the certainty in her bones. They were the First Folk. Klaue. Klogs.
Faia pressed her face into the grass and cried silently; she was afraid—she could hear people moaning and sobbing from the battlements and from the ground around them. Terrible things had happened and were happening. The Klaue were going to find her. They were going to lift her into the air and rip her limb from limb. She would never see Kirtha again.
Beside her, Delmuirie moved an arm around her and held her tightly—and she was grateful for the comfort he gave.
The earth beneath them shook, and nearby a Klog roared. That hellish roar was a sound that made a pack of hunting kellinks sound gentle by comparison. Faia prayed she would never hear it again.
Then the Klogs lifted as one, as if to a silent signal, and still screaming, flapped away with slow, steady wingbeats toward the east.
For long moments neither Faia nor Edrouss Delmuirie moved. Then Edrouss sat up and pulled her close. He held her for a moment, and she rested against his chest and shook. He was crying, too, she realized, and he trembled as well.
“I’ve never seen them like that,” he whispered. “They were like animals.”
“They were animals,” Faia whispered with conviction.
“They weren’t before,” he said. “I knew them before. They were vicious bastards… but not like that.”
They lay still a few moments longer, while the sobbing and shouting along the city walls went on and on. At last Faia felt her courage return, and she pulled free of Delmuirie’s embrace. They rose. The hillock behind which they’d hidden was just high enough to make it good cover. Faia was grateful—without it, she and Delmuirie might have been dead. They walked to the top of it, hoping to see where Bytoris had hidden.