She climbed where she had to, walked where she could, her lungs burning and her limbs aching, leaden. At last, she thought, when she risked looking up, they were stopping ahead. Roth was waving them on urgently, even though the beast seemed at rest, its pose almost languid, like it, too, belonged on these frozen slopes. How easily its clawed feet could climb these mountains. No foolish sandals for Roth.
She cursed under her breath that she had not thought to come prepared…but then when had she had the chance to equip herself with winter clothing? In Beheth, where it was always temperate and the citizens had never needed, let alone seen, a cloak?
Her feet and hands were frozen, her breath frosted the air. At least if she kept moving she would not freeze to death. But she was deathly cold. Perhaps, in the mountain’s heights, it was the cold as much as the altitude that stole the breath and sapped the energy.
She followed on, staring at Renir’s broad back, rather than at the sheer drop below or the ominous sheets of ice above.
As if sensing her discomfort, he stopped and turned to face her.
“I’m a fool. My wife always said so, and I’m inclined to see her way of things these days.” He shrugged off his thick cloak and handed it to her.
“I cannot! You’ll freeze to death.”
“Somehow I don’t think I will. I might be cold, but I’d rather be cold than watch someone else freeze to death. Take the cloak. It is warm. Besides, I’m sweating now. Oh! I don’t mean I’ve made the cloak sweaty…it’s quite clean…it doesn’t even smell…I’ve been wearing it all week...” he paused for breath, looking slightly red in the face. “That’s another thing my wife always said, I talk too much. I’d be grateful if you’d take the cloak.” He held out the cloak – perhaps smelly, perhaps sweaty, but above all warm – bashfully.
“Thank you, Renir. If the gods be kind to us, we’ll both be warm before this day is out.”
“Don’t see how, Tiri, but I’ll drink to that. Warm, in a nice comfy bed. I can’t remember the last time I was warm, or slept in a bed. I think I might smell of Teryithyrian, too. They don’t make the most comfortable of sleeping partners. Not that I’ve slept with one, if you know what I…ah, never mind me.”
They had caught up the others, and for some reason Tirielle found that the strange warrior had made her smile. His countenance was terrible, but under the grime and the beard she realised he did not have the look of a slayer, but of an ordinary man, with kinder eyes than usually.
Behind her, a massive slab of ice cracked and fell loose, crashing to pieces down the side of the shifting mountain. Shivers racked her body, then, and she hugged herself. The cloak was comfortingly warm, with the warrior’s body heat. It cut out the piercing wind, too.
She was not one to overlook the little mercies. She was thankful for what she could get.
“Perhaps we should wait for your friend,” said Roth to Cenphalph, where they were paused before a great, smooth round boulder, incongruous amongst the ragged rock and fragile shale.
Tirielle looked round and saw an old man walking up the side of the mountain. He wasn’t sticking to the path, but leaping nimbly over rock and crag with the ease of a mountain goat. His beard reached his waist, and his hair was even longer.
Drun Sard, her mind supplied. He was everything she had imagined and more. No man could climb the rock as swiftly without the aid of magic. Not at his age. He must be ancient for his white hair to grow as long. She smiled at the sight of him.
“He’ll catch up,” said Shorn. Tirielle noticed his voice lisped slightly, no doubt a result of the blow he had taken to his face. She took pains not to stare.
She felt she should make some form of introduction, but she was too short of breath join in the conversation.
“How are we to move it?” said Quintal, eyeing the rock baring their way. It was as the map had described it. Worn thin with age and the inhospitable weather, Tirielle could see the markings described in the scroll. It was the entrance to the depths of the mountain. She could think of many places she would rather go. A small, snide part of her piped up…and what if it never moves? How long till the soldiers catch up? How long will we last against an army?
She shook herself and looked at the old man climbing steadily toward them. He would be there soon.
“I think this is why I came,” said Roth. It seemed sad, and spared a glance at Tirielle. She wondered what it was she saw there on Roth’s face. It was something she had not seen before. It looked, to her, like acceptance. Always before it had fought, never giving in. Now it seemed as though the mighty beasts will had crumbled.
“Look at the marking. It is a hand.”
“But it’s massive…” said Quintal, and tailed off. “I see.”
Roth merely nodded, and placed its right hand on the rock. Its hand fitted the carving perfectly.
A beautiful humming accompanied the giant’s actions, and Tirielle looked around for the source of the resonating song…it was coming from Shorn’s sword, clenched in his good hand – he had obviously damaged the other, for it was encased in a silvery brace, with a sharp, flared blade along his forearm.
His sword was singing!
Magic was not dead on this continent, either.
The song rose, and the stone moved aside with a grating rumble, even though Roth was not pushing. Warm air escaped the growing gap. Steam rose, buffeted by the wind. It was hot in there. Hot enough for steam. She did not think she would need the cloak for much longer.
“Greetings,” called a pleasant voice from behind her. “You are the First, and I am the Watcher.” She started at the sudden voice, her concentration fully on the shifting boulder, and turned to see Drun Sard beaming at her. His eyes were beautifully golden, just like his warrior brothers, but bore none of the haunted look that the paladins wore so well.
“I don’t intend to Sacrifice myself. Drun Sard, I presume. I can’t say it’s a pleasure. Under different circumstances, perhaps…”
“Entirely understandable, lady. It is my pleasure. Shall we?” he said, and held out his arm. To her surprise she found herself taking it. He led her toward the darkness behind the rock.
She entered.
Another blasted tunnel, she thought. Why is it my battles cannot be fought on the open plain, instead of in the darkness?
But she was not given the chance to baulk at her fate, as she might have done, staring at the gaping hole, so like a beast’s cavernous maw. Drun Sard held her arm firmly, and led her, once more, into darkness.
*
Chapter Eighty-Six
Klan rebounded and landed with a crash at Jek’s feet.
“You weren’t gone long,” said Jek as if Klan’s unexpected return was of little consequence.
Klan rose and dusted himself off. He winced as he tried to put his weight on his left foot. It seemed he had broken it again.
“Something is holding me back. I tried to travel to base camp, but it is like it does not exist. I will have to go further afield.”
“Well, don’t let me stop you. It’s not like we have pressing matters to attend to. Perhaps I should take charge…”
“I will do my duty, Speculate!” shouted Klan with venom.
“Then do it! I will tolerate no failure.”
Jek’s eyes blazed with fury. Klan turned his aside. Now was not the time to test himself against Jek. Instead, he turned his power to the travel, to building the tunnel…and without another word, stepped inside.
He could not make the tunnel go near the base camp. It seemed it was now a blasted land, the places that were anathema to mages. He could not emerge there. From the other world, he sent out wisps of his consciousness, searching for a safe place to alight…he searched the ground and saw the reason he could not land at base camp – it had been annihilated. The portal had destroyed a vast swathe of land…around it his forces still battled with the Teryithyr. Magic crackled through the aether…he could feel it prickle his skin even in the strange world of voices that his
body currently inhabited.
Magic was growing. He snarled in frustration. The expenditure of magical energy and the catastrophic explosion of the portal were preventing him from joining the battle. But, he saw, his quarry were no longer in the midst of the battle. He searched for them everywhere, and found footsteps, finally, leading up the side of the mountain spewing ash…he followed them, his soul floating behind the film that was reality…followed them to a gaping hole in the side of the mountain.
It was far enough away from the battle and the swirling magic to transport his body to. With a feat of concentration, he coalesced his body together as a whole, stepped from a hole torn in from the under world where souls travelled, and onto the ash covered mountainside.
The voices seemed to cry with relief when he left that strange world.
One day he would have Fernip read about travelling. For now, he had his duty…his obsession. He would have the three, or the wizard, it mattered not. The end was near. They had eluded his grasp for so long, but in the end, they had shown him the way. At last, he knew where they were, and this time, there would be no escape.
As he stepped into the cave, the mountain began to shake itself apart.
A sudden crash came from behind him, the grating rumble of rock falling, and the entrance caved in. It did not matter. He could always travel out again. He would never be trapped, anywhere. The day’s light fled, but he was never in darkness. His eyes lit the way before him.
He followed the path downward, ever down, with a grim smile on his face and his blood red eyes glowing, burning, with anticipation.
*
Chapter Eighty-Seven
Outside, unnoticed, fire spewed forth from the mountain, running in rivers along its crest, raining molten rock and heated boulders onto the warrior’s fighting below. The Teryithyrians retreated, able to run much faster than the soldiers of the Protectorate. It was carnage on a massive scale. The dead littered the wastelands, some caught fire, many ran as fast as they could from the inferno, all thoughts of battle forgotten, each red-robed soldier and wizard of the Anamnesors no match for the fury of the volcano. Lava ran in wide rivers, steam joined the clouds of ash. Black rain fell, hissing onto the ice.
Soldiers ran streaming from the mountainside, intent only on survival. The Teryithyr, who had watched and waited for an age, for millennia, had performed their duty to the last wizard, the red one, who they had failed so long ago. Their brethren, never forgotten, on a distant continent across the sea, once joined by a bridge of ice but now moved on, had stood to the last beside the red wizard, and received his gift. The Teryithyr had shunned his gifts, never trusting him, but had been charged with guarding his resting place.
They were free of their geas. They melted back into the wilderness. Their reward was coming already. The ice would recede and their land would once again wake. It was promised, and as they could see, it was already coming true. The ice around the mountains was flowing water once more. No more the exile in the white wastes. Seasons, long forgotten, would return. The Teryithyr ran freely, many lost, but a new beginning ahead of them.
*
Chapter Eighty-Eight
It was strangely quiet within the cavern. The cries from the battle outside were no more than a memory within the halls and tunnels underneath the mountain. The tunnels were man-made – or rahken-made – by the looks of them. They seemed designed. Utilitarian, yes, but uniform in appearance. They led further into the depths. The tunnels twisted this way and that, crazily meandering, leading into caverns with great domed roofs, similar in construction to Roth’s home under the hills south of Lianthre.
No one spoke. Drun concentrated on lighting the way for them, his eyes glowing golden against the darkness. Their footfalls were soft, but their breathing was heavy. Although the tunnel led ever downwards, the air was no easier to breath. It was hot, sulphurous air that burnt the lungs and leeched away all energy.
Tirielle spared a thought for those dying outside. But if they were truly rahkens in all but colour she imagined they could handle themselves quite adequately in battle.
She wondered if it was their hand she saw in the caves and tunnels they passed. Magnificent pictorial histories adorned the ceilings and walls of caverns they traversed, intersperse between winding tunnels and, on one occasion, a bridge spanning a deep chasm, full of fire. It was remarkable that the bridge had not collapsed in the shaking. But it seemed the mountain was calmer on the inside. Like it waited for them, held its breath in anticipation.
She had no idea where she was going, but she could hear a steady, regular rumbling coming from lower down. The path did not deviate. There were no decisions to make, no forks in the path.
Everything leading up to a final moment of clarity. An end to her purpose…and her life?
She was not ready to die. To give it all up, hand the mantle over to another…if it freed her people she could accept it…but she did not want to die. There was so much to live for, so much more she knew she could achieve. But if the wizard was a legend, a being of immense power as he was fabled to be, then he could achieve more in one minute than she could in a lifetime.
Would he be a worthy successor in the battle to come? Could he truly halt the return that the Sard feared, that they had spent their life preparing to confront? If so, then she would pass on, without fear in her heart, but with regret.
She took comfort in the fact that she would meet her father again in the after world, and j’ark would be there to greet her, alongside all the other fallen. In the after world, there would be no Protectorate. It was the one place where a soul could truly be free of fear…
Her mind spitefully reminded her of the lost souls in the portal…no, she could not be sure. Perhaps the Protectorate had even subordinated the world of the dead. Though they surely had no souls of their own, the dead were still cattle to them, herding into a portal to hold back the darkness between the stars. Fuel, perhaps, in their insane hatred that drove them in all things.
She could only hope the last wizard could halt their progress. If she could do anything, anything at all, to stop their plans, even destroy them, if she could, she would do it, and while she would be sad to leave the world, she would give herself freely. What were tears and regrets to the dead?
Perhaps, she thought with sneaking hope, her title did not mean her death. The Sard had reminded her, as had the Seer, that there were many forms of Sacrifice. But could she fool herself into believing all would end well?
If they should triumph this day, how would they return to Lianthre? How were the rahkens faring in their own battle against the Protectorate? Without her, could they rally the humans to their cause…her cause? She could not leave it behind. It was her battle, and she would fight to the last not to give it up, not before she saw her people free. Free to live without terror, without oppression. For those with magic to return to her country and use their powers to improve life, not, as the Protectorate did, to suppress it.
So much to live for.
It tore at her, but she knew no matter how much she lived, she could not outwit fate. She did not want to die. But neither would she stand in the way of destiny. She could bear the loss, if only to do her duty. j’ark was not the only creature of duty. It had subsumed her, too.
She turned her eyes to Drun’s glowing light, and strode on, down into the deep, toward the steady, growing beat of the mountain’s heart.
*
Chapter Eighty-Nine
Shorn looked up at the roof of a cavern as they passed. A great mural had been made on the domed ceiling. He strained in the dim light of Drun’s magic, but could not make out any detail. It seemed as though there was a man in the centre of the picture, holding out his hands wide in a gesture of supplication. He was surrounded by the white beasts, and the brown, like Roth. In the picture there were two suns, but only one moon.
“How am I supposed to trust such a beast?” he had whispered the man called Typraille as they descended into the murk. “It co
uld tear me in two.”
“I as do,” smiled the armoured warrior, his moustaches twitching. “With your life.”
It seemed, from the telling, that Roth’s kind made murals, too. Typraille had seen them. They must be related. From the picture, it seemed the white and the brown had stood together with the figure – who could only be the wizard they were searching for. But the information meant to little to him. He was not a man to worry about things he did not understand. If he lost sleep over everything he did not understand, he would be forever staring at the moon. He worried instead about the pretty woman. She was gnawing at her lip.
The Sacrifice, Drun had told her.
Was he meant to save her? Save himself?
He did not know what was meant for him, what the immediate future had in store for him, but he knew that should the wizard wake he would find himself whole again, with a new purpose, a meaning in his life. He did not intend to die in this cave. When he died it would be in the suns’ light, his sword in his hand and his enemies fallen at his feet.
It had been his life until now, but he was changing. He recognised it in himself. Where once he would never have dreamed of risking his life for anything but the thrill of battle, to test himself against endless foes, now he found himself caring about his companions.
Staunch Bourninund, his sword-mate through countless battles. He could not imagine the Bear, as Renir had taken to calling the old warrior, searching his soul for anything. To him, the fight was all about the money, anything that allowed him to drink and womanise. Even for him, though, such days might be getting short. Perhaps he just wished to die in battle, not in ignominy, lost to cancer or bone-rot, wasting in some hovel, mourned by none. At least in battle he knew his brothers would weep for him, at the last.
Tides of Rythe (The Rythe Trilogy) Page 33