The Redemption of Wist Boxed Set: Books 1 - 3: The complete collection

by David Gilchrist

  ‘Decheal tried to sharpen them, but she reckons she would need a wheel to grind them.’

  ‘Do you want me to try?’ she asked.

  ‘No,’ said Wist, ‘you have spent enough of yourself. They will do fine.’

  ‘It does not cost me anything. As I said, I was only tired. When I work with metal it is… calming.’

  ‘Like Nikka with his stone,’ said Haumea, and Wist nodded.

  ‘He made this for me,’ said the Giantess and held up her white staff. ‘He made it from the petrified bones of some massive creature, or so he said to me.’ She laughed and lifted one of the ice-picks.

  ‘Let’s waste no more time here,’ said Wist. ‘I know you need more rest Aviti and I wish I could give you it, but I can’t. We have barely enough food for another couple of days. I don’t think we’ll find any here.’

  ‘Yes. Let us be underway.’ said Aviti, pulling her cloak into position. Then she lifted the hood to cover the few inches of black hair on her head.

  Outside, the air was dead calm. Aviti shivered again and drew her clothes tighter to herself, though it did not help. It was a beautiful star-filled night, without a cloud to obscure their view. The valley that they had left behind was still full of mist below them obscuring the Wyverns and the destruction that Oinoir had caused.

  At the western side of the mountain’s edge, Aviti noticed a depression snaking around the contour of the hill, so she called to the Giants and they came over. When she pointed it out, Decheal stepped forward onto a protruding ledge and peered out.

  ‘Is it a path?’ asked Aviti.

  After a moment, she said, ‘It is no path. There are... bodies in there, and some of them are still moving.’

  ‘Still moving?’ asked Aviti as Wist joined Decheal.

  She indicated a patch of snow-ladened ground between this mountain and its neighbour. Aviti stared at it, but could not make out what the Giantess had seen, but Wist could.

  He turned away and said, ‘They aren’t alive, if that is what concerns you.’ Aviti stopped him with a hand on his shoulder and he twisted his head to say, ‘It’s the Damned, Aviti. Perhaps they are the poor souls that escaped the Wyvern only to perish there?’

  A shudder coursed through Aviti as she thought of the Damned that she had obliterated using her magic, whilst enslaved by the Intoli. Wist’s brother Tilden had forced her to do so.

  Aviti was glad she could not make out the wretched creatures. Then she too turned away and looked at the mountain that lay in their way. The spine of it ran from her left hand to the peak high on her right-hand side. There were several false summits and a large notch missing on the Eastern side. This mountain had two, almost flat, faces. The rock on this side was more exposed than the far away one.

  Aviti pointed to the notch and said, ‘Perhaps we should try for that?’

  ‘We do not climb it just to say we conquered the mountain,‘ Wist laughed

  Haumea interjected and asked ‘How does one conquer a mountain? It is not a foe?’

  ‘Is it not?’ Decheal replied in Wist’s stead. ‘Tell me that again if we make the other side. No, I agree with Wist. We ascend here and see how far up we need to go to make an attempt at crossing.

  They had already donned their equipment so, at Wist’s insistence, they tethered themselves together once more. This time Decheal led and Haumea came last. Aviti had to convince Sevika that it was necessary to attach her to them.

  When they started walking up the gentle initial slopes Aviti said, ‘You wanted to go with Tyla, Sevika?’

  Her head twitched and she said, ‘No,’ she but without conviction.

  Aviti smiled at her and, on an impulse, she embraced the Intoli. The Intoli stiffened, but Aviti did not release her. Aviti held her until she felt steady enough to move on.

  ‘How long will it take us to get to the Dhuma?’ Aviti asked.

  ‘I do not know,’ said Sevika. ‘I cannot tell. Time is… starting to come apart.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Aviti asked. ‘Time is just time.’

  ‘And will tomorrow always come?’ said Sevika as they moved.

  Aviti’s eyes flicked from the Intoli to the sky and back again.

  ‘How can there be a tomorrow without the Source?’

  ‘The Sun, the Source as you name it is still there,’ said Aviti mouthing aloud what she had feared to admit to herself.

  ‘You’re right,’ said Wist.

  ‘I am?’ Aviti said, before she caught herself.

  ‘The moon, it reflects sunlight,’ said Wist. ‘Or the one in my world does anyway. This moon, it behaves differently. I can’t quite figure it out.’

  My world.

  His world. How could there be another world? But why not? Her father had lectured her endlessly about all the things she did not know, and how it had bored her. Now…she yearned to hear him once more, but she had trapped him, or at least his soul. Her desperate need for salvation from imminent death had pulled the essence of her father back to her. Now he was trapped, just like all those damned. Except they had bodies and no soul. Her father was disincarnated.

  ‘It is the Sister of the Source,’ said Sevika. ‘How can it still be?’

  ‘It is as Wist said,’ Aviti said, then realised again that the Intoli would not have only understood Wist’s words. ‘The moon reflects the sun. If there is light in the moon, the sun still burns.’

  She thought of her precious desert, the one towards which Tyla ran. This black sun tortures the land, but it would destroy the desert. Still, she could not think about that. Now, they must overcome a mountain.

  The snow underfoot grew deeper as they climbed. It also became less compact and more like ice. It made walking easier as their spikes could now gain purchase.

  Cold crept up her legs as she walked. At first, the pain was sharp and immediate, but now it depressed her senses. It took them hours to reach the start of the first proper climb. The Ghria Duh had still not risen, but that was of little comfort to them.

  ‘What about the other Intoli?’ Aviti asked Sevika in an attempt to distract herself.

  ‘What of them?’ asked Sevika, her voice as uneven as her brow. When Aviti had first seen the Intoli, when she had been captured and enslaved, they had all looked the same; flawless and perfect. Now, Sevika looked anything but.

  ‘Can you still feel them? Are they still alive?’

  ‘Alive?’ Sevika repeated. ‘I know they are still on Pyrite, the ones that came with us.’

  ‘Are there any still here, on Prasad, at the Dhuma?’

  ‘They are absent,’ Sevika replied whilst walking on. Nothing impeded her movement. Her footsteps barely made an impression on the ice.

  ‘Absent?’ said Aviti. ‘You mean they have gone somewhere?’

  ‘No. They had departed. Their light extinguished. Like the Source.’

  Aviti let the comment about the Source go unchallenged. ‘What has happened to them?’

  Sevika made an awkward movement with her shoulders. ‘The Waren has taken them. The darkness will take us all.’

  Aviti took an exasperated breath. Then she said, ‘And what of Enceladus, or Ravan? Why has he abandoned us now?’

  ‘He abandoned us before. Is it of import that he has abandoned us again?’

  Aviti’s footing gave way and she went down onto one knee, pulling the rope between herself, Wist and Sevika tight. Her knee stung with the impact, but she rubbed it, got up and kept going. Then she heard Decheal’s laugh and Aviti had to bite back an angry response as she rose.

  ‘Time to climb, little humans,’ Decheal bellowed. The mountain had brought back some of her spirit. ‘Shall I help you Aviti?’

  Aviti got the ice pick that she had made out from her pack. ‘Do not forget I am Beira, Queen of Winter.’

  Decheal laughed at her temerity.

  ‘Are you ready for this?’ Wist asked Aviti.

  ‘Are you?’ she shot back.

  Wist laughed as well. ‘Probably not. I dou
bt trekking across the world is good preparation for a mountain climb.’

  Then Aviti smiled. ‘Sorry. I am nervous. It is so cold here. I cannot feel my fingers. How am I meant to climb?’

  ‘I can barely feel my legs,’ said Wist, ‘but I make myself walk.’

  Aviti smiled once more. ‘Walking is not the same as climbing. Especially not climbing that thing.’ She pointed up at the mountain, which now dominated their horizon.

  ‘I guess. Still, it’s either that or die here.’

  She knew the truth of it, but it did not lessen her fear.

  Decheal was the first to let his pick bite into the compacted ice. The crack echoed down to the rest of them. Then the command to move came. One by one, they followed. Only Sevika did not carry any tools for climbing. She appeared to be immune to the lure of gravity.

  The first hundred yards were easy. Aviti found it a relief to use her arms as well as her legs to move. Despite its blunt edge, the pick bit into the mountains’ frozen coat with ease. The next section was much harder. Less snow lay on this patch, meaning that the solid rock was nearer the surface. By the time they reached the third section, her arms burned. She could see Decheal making easy progress at the head of the chain. The hardest part for the Giantess was waiting for the rest of them.

  Decheal hauled herself up and over an overhanging ledge. Aviti only caught a glimpse of the Giantess as her hands began to tremble.

  There was so little light here. She could make out the sky and the ledge as she looked up, but nothing else, so she ground her teeth and caressed her bond with Tyla. It was thinner, less distinct, but still as real. She felt his worry for his people, so she thought of her love for him. Her pointless, hopeless love for a man she would never see again.

  Find me, Tyla had said. She would have laughed, but her teeth banged together. She was a tiny spec on a mountain, with only the slightest hope that she would even reach the top. How would she ever find him?

  But did it matter if she never saw him again? He was the bravest, smartest man she had ever met. So, she sent him her strength, hope and love, and whilst she thought of the Lyrat, she dragged herself up to the ledge. As she reached for the lip, her left arm muscle cramped. She yelped in pain and pulled it back, but a massive hand grabbed it. Then she was hoisted into the air and crashed down beside the others. As she scrambled to her feet, the remainder of the company crawled onto the ledge. Aviti rubbed her arm as the spasm subsided.

  Then Wist moved beside her and took the hand of the arm that pained her. He straightened it out and flexed her fingers. She tried to pull her hand away, but his grip was too firm. He manipulated her arm, moving it back and forth. The pain intensified with the first few stretches and she swallowed a mouthful of frost, which the wind had blown into her face. Then the pain faded as he continued to push and pull her arm.

  Then Wist stepped back and smiled. ‘That was hard,’ he said. ‘But doesn’t imminent death make you feel alive?’ There was a wild glint in his eyes. Perhaps it was just the torch, which Haumea had relit, catching in his eyes, but Aviti trembled as she looked upon the madness in his soul. Then Wist laughed and turned away.

  Haumea thrust another torch into Aviti’s still outstretched hand, slapped her on the back and told her to move, so she did. She moved without asking their destination. At least they were only walking and not climbing. Her arms swung at her sides, impossibly heavy, but she plodded on and let the rope guide her. Before she knew it, there was rock over her head once more.

  Yellow light blossomed on the ceiling. After enduring hours of the harsh monochrome world outside, it was a delight. As Aviti watched, the colours on the ceiling flowed from yellow to red and orange, and back again, she could imagine that she was home. She could be lying in that cave at the foot of the rift that ran along the northern edge of her city, Mashesh; the cave where Tyla helped her recover from the Warens’ attack, the attack that had awoken her power.

  Within moments, sensation returned to Aviti’s frozen limbs. She sat up and looked at her companions. At least they were all still here. The Giants were busy at the fire. Wist sat alongside her and Sevika stood at the mouth of this cave staring out.

  ‘We are not going to make this,’ said Aviti.

  Wist shook his head, but Aviti continued. ‘I will not make it. I do not have the strength to go on. We do not have the food nor the time to waste.’

  ‘I will not leave you here Aviti,’ said Wist. ‘Do not ask me to do that. I won’t leave a man behind.’

  Aviti looked at him for a moment until he said, ‘Or a woman.’ Then he added, ‘Or a Giant or even an Intoli.’

  ‘What about Oinoir?’ said Decheal.

  ‘Wist exhaled a huge gout of steam into the air, then he said ‘I still hope he will come back to us. But I won’t leave any of you.’

  ‘Shall you carry us then brave Dionach? That is a feat I should like to witness.’

  ‘If I have to,’ said Wist, as the passion drained from his voice.

  Haumea handed out a small packet of dried meat to each of them. Decheal examined hers before exclaiming, ‘Are things really this bad Haumea?’ The Giantess’ mouth turned downwards and she went back to sit at her bedroll. ‘I am sorry Haumea, please take no offense. I would just rather freeze to death with a full belly.’

  Aviti laughed and Haumea smiled as well. Then Aviti grimaced as a lance of pain shot out from her shoulder. Sevika watched her as she massaged the mass of skin below her clothes until the sensation passed.

  ‘Do you regret what you and your people did?’ Aviti asked the Intoli.

  Sevika blinked several times and then said, ‘Regret? Should I regret trying to save your world?’

  ‘Yes, perhaps I should thank the Intoli?’ said Aviti. ‘I should be bitter. I should hate you White Demons, as the Giants call you, but you have only been another tool of the Waren. Manipulated by them and Tilden, and your own fears, into destroying what you love rather than risk losing it.’

  ‘Enough talking,’ said Decheal. ‘Get some rest.’

  Aviti knew she was right. Whatever came next, she needed to sleep now, so she lay out flat and watched the patterns on the roof of the chamber dance. She jumped when a piece of wood popped in the fire, but then she settled back again and the crackle of the fire lulled her to sleep.

  She jerked awake and fought off disorientation and a coppery taste in her mouth. Everyone but Haumea was still asleep. She hummed to herself as she poked the fire. Aviti sat up and the Giantess said, ‘You should be sleeping.’

  Aviti smiled at Haumea. ‘Do you have any more food left?’

  Haumea returned her smile and reached behind her to give her another strip of meat. Aviti chewed on it for a while.

  ‘Dragon?’ asked Aviti.

  Haumea nodded.

  ‘My father would have loved to watch me chew on a Dragon’s innards. That would have made him laugh.’

  At the mention of Aviti’s father, Haumea touched her staff. The mottled white beam lay across her lap, resting in the hollow of her crossed legs.

  ‘May I see it?’ Aviti asked. In truth, she was not interested in it, but she did not want to answer questions about her father.

  ‘Of course,’ said the Giantess and she passed it around the fire to her.

  Aviti lay it across her lap the same way that Haumea had, but she struggled to balance it. It felt alive when she touched it, as if it tried to flee from her, as if it fought to get back to its true owner. She ran her fingers over the thick staff, feeling the joints, where Nikka had skilfully merged the pieces, though it was not her hands that sensed the tiny fractures. The melding was perfect, as far as the eye could see, but when she closed her eyes and reached inside the mottled staff, the flow was all wrong. She tried pulling magic through it, but it resisted her. Rather than flow through it, Aviti’s contact with the magic broke off as she tried to pull more. Then she received a spike of pain as she paid the price for her mistake.

  It was brief, but it was intense
. It brought back visions of dead trees and the Damned, and dust. Dust that had covered her. Dust from those poor wretches that she had been forced to release from their endless torment.

  With a firm grip on her resolve, Aviti probed the staff again. This time she did not force her will upon it, but feathered the joins with her magic. It did not come to her at once, but after a moment of probing, it came to her.

  ‘It is not a tool for focusing power,’ she said aloud as she opened her eyes.

  ‘No,’ smiled Haumea, ‘it is not.’

  ‘It is for… it is for fixing… for healing.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Haumea. ‘But for healing what?’

  Aviti rolled it around one more time and then slipped it back to Haumea. She stared at her hands and watched the firelight dance in them.

  ‘It feels like it is still there.’

  ‘Aviti?’

  ‘Your staff. If I was to close my eyes right now, I would swear that I still held it.’ She exhaled, and then breathed in the soot-infused air. ‘I know it is not mine. Nikka made it, created it for you, but I feel its… loss. If that makes any sense.’

  ‘Some,’ said Haumea.

  The others woke then. First Decheal, then Wist rose and accepted the small parcel of food that Haumea gave them. Wist thanked the Giantess, but Decheal did not. They ate with the noise of the fire as the only accompaniment to the sounds of them eating.

  ‘How are we going to get over this mountain Wist?’ Aviti asked. ‘And what about the ones behind this one? You know they must be there.’

  Wist took another bite of his food. ‘Yes,’ he said between mouthfuls, ‘I know.’

  ‘So, what is your answer?’

  Wist chewed and chewed, but he did not answer. He just looked at Aviti and continued his meal.

  ‘I have already answered your question Aviti,’ said Decheal.

  ‘What?’ she replied.

  ‘We will carry you.’

  Aviti laughed, but fell silent when she saw the determination in the warrior’s blunt face.

  ‘You are serious?’ she asked, but she knew the answer before Decheal nodded.

  She was just too weary to think of an alternative, so she nodded back. Taking it as a direct order, Decheal rose and started packing, as did Haumea.