by C F Welburn
“Are you done with your questions?” Planter’s rasping voice snagged him from his stream of consciousness. Balagir considered, then nodded.
“Here, Huir, or Planter, or whoever you may have been. Take this and be at peace.” Balagir withdrew the skull from his bag and handed it over. Planter unhinged the skull from his spine and slowly, with both hands, as though it were a crown, refitted his proper skull in place. The bone shimmered, and before Balagir’s eyes he saw first muscle, then sinew, then flesh, then skin mesh and weave themselves over the skeletal framework. When it was done, a pale-skinned, long-haired ashen stood, looking at him through the mist. There was a haunting coldness in his eyes. Eyes blacker than peat bogs.
“I’m free,” he murmured at last. Balagir nodded, acknowledging the smoke which filled his belt. Planter began to laugh, a melancholy sound midst the skeletal trunks. “I recall my name… Botswa.” Botswa. A sickness upon him. A black-eyed sickness. Had it truly been that long? This ashen would make even the relics youthful in comparison. When he had exhausted himself, he turned and stretched his hand out to kalaqai. “Come back to me,” he bade. Alarmed, Balagir watched her waver, indecisive in the space between them. Whomever she betrayed would be the one she could least exploit.
“She’s mine now, Planter. We had a deal, be gone.”
“That’s no longer my name, Balagir, and the kalaqai is mine. Has been for a very long time.”
“We are bound, and I own the wand. Your time is over. Go, be at peace. Leave the forest.”
“It saddens me to kill the one who has saved me. Desist.”
“And I regret killing one I have previously saved. Be gone and live.”
Botswa sighed and drew forth a rusty blade that had hung long unused. He raised it without zeal, resigned to his grim task.
He was about to move but was given pause by a thudding noise behind. Then another from the right. And another. Balagir followed one of the skull fruits as it fell to the decaying leaves.
Botswa looked distracted as more of the grisly fruit dropped, burying themselves in the earth. Then the ground began to tremble, and from where the first had fallen, a white spike erupted. Then another, and a further two, twisting, stretching upwards in rapid growth. Balagir began to retreat, even as a new sapling burst from the spot he had been standing and quickly grew into a gnarled and knotted limb. The ground groaned. Old trees were thrust aside by the sudden germination of the new, creaking and toppling. Balagir caught one final glimpse of his pursuer as the trees enveloped him, sealing him in a tall, bone prison, piercing him with brittle branches and sharp twigs that sprouted out with the swiftness of prodding spears. He cried out in pain and finally terrible anguish. Blood wet the thick roots.
Balagir ran, Kalaqai in tow, having made her decision, or having had it made for her. He sidestepped trees that sundered the earth and thrust his feet, ducking stabbing branches that suddenly barred his path. Botswa’s spent smoke caught up with him as he went, the potency of which made him stumble, yet he did not slow. Not until he reached the hub and threw himself through a rift as the usurper branches made of it a fiery heart in a tightening ribcage of incarceration.
Somehow in that madness, he had had the clarity of thought to take himself where he must go. Back to Ozgar. Still plucking bone twigs from his tangled hair, he entered the town and went directly to Lye Tower. He kept his eyes down and fortuitously arrived unhindered, ascending the steps two at a time. Sweeping the dusty shelves and cluttered surfaces, his eyes rested upon one of the triangular prisms he had seen Sisken use. Coaxing Era into his palm, he flinched as it snapped shut about her. She flared furiously, and he did not relish her imminent scorn.
He held the prism aloft and marvelled at her transparency, her sublime inner workings.
“Now, Era, finally we get to speak.”
But she did not speak of course. For a start she had no mouth, and even if she had, how could such a primordial entity communicate in anything as prosaic as words. Even so, as he scrutinised her, he began to divine patterns that played on his black retinas. Pulses and flickers that projected on his brain like an intricate map. The room faded into insignificance as the complexity flooded his mind and occupied every fibre of his essence.
What do you want? he thought, in words that were not really words.
Nothing. Closed. Even now her patterns would not aid him. But seeing her, or rather sensing her in this way, he began to understand. What would anyone want who was bound? Who was forever cursed, banished from their kin, shackled to a slave, forced to survive by manipulating a drudgeon? He didn’t need the askaba’s device to tell him that. It should have been clear.
Freedom.
The word came to him like a prodding finger. He flinched but did not loosen the contact. How had he not known? Of course, she was as much prisoner as he. Kindled by Jakan, trapped by the tune, torn from her realm to be incarcerated in a world which was not her own. And for an eternity. With no hope of release. Forced to kindle fires, relentlessly. To abide one host after the next. Ihnoban, Botswa, Gwindle, Balagir… a shameful parasite. Thus, her plan had come to be: betrayal. Not through any allegiance with Kaliga, but through desperation. For release. Surely nothingness was preferable to endless enslavement.
He scanned the surface of this flickering light, finding the faults, feeling the edges. Things came into focus. When the hiilg had waned and lost the wand, she had found her cognisance. Just as the ashen arrived, a crude, violent race, Jakan’s flawed servants—and she bound to them. The hiilg were forgotten and the dhaki gone, but she was doomed to remain with the black-eyes. First one, then another. Fearing the askaba who would stretch her life in an enduring torture, despising the ashen who floundered and fought, her plan had evolved. A plan that would require an ashen capable of executing it. A plan that would require not just the wand, but a journey to the isle. Botswa had been close, but not close enough. Gwindle had infuriated her. He saw now it had been her that had chosen him, not the other way about. She had changed him that day. He had questioned his purpose, and others had followed his course, aiding him, carrying him south towards the wand, towards a power that would see him discover truths in the hiilg temple. From there through the map to Ceniza. The bitter price she had to pay for freedom. He sensed in her a hatred, deep and ingrained. For the ashen and askaba alike, for the hiilg and the dhaki and, especially, for Jakan. But he sensed something else too; something conflicting. Luck. That had not been part of her plan. That had been unforeseen.
It had changed her and, in doing so, had changed him. He should never have gotten this far. After Ceniza she no longer needed him. Her indifference hurt. They had come so far together, and all that while he had been nothing to her. A means to an end. But it was the luck she wore that had brought him here now. To learn of her plan; to stop it.
Suddenly she pulsed, and the prism shattered.
She darted about, angry as an avisp, yet she could no sooner hurt him than one could suffocate oneself. Or was it more? She had been exposed. Naked. He had trespassed and tainted her. It should not have happened. A lowly being should not peer into an essence so pure.
Luck, Balagir mused, baying her to his pouch. And for the first time in his memory, he knew what he must do.
XXX.ii
FOR CRIMES UNPUNISHED
His descent of Lye Tower was met by sounds of a hurried ascent.
“Kolak?” He was surprised to see the jaegir here, and the consternation in his eyes and sweat on his brow did little to put him at ease. “How’d you find me? What’s wrong? I thought you’d gone back to the channel?”
“The device you have allowed Imram to locate you.” Balagir had quite forgotten about the askaba’s communication cube and was unsettled to learn it actively tracked him. “There’s something you need to see. Something coming from… Ceniza.” His voice stuck on the word.
Balagir swallowed. It had started. The pieces had fallen into place with scant notice to benefit.
“We were
waiting for a ship…” Words failed him.
“Show me,” Balagir said ominously. Kolak simply nodded.
They acted wordlessly, warping from Ozgar to the outskirts of Kasker. The air smelt of brine, and something else. When he reached the shore, he identified the odour.
The black column of smoke and ash stretched to impossible heights. Like a black finger, it stroked the heavens. To be seen from so far, he had no doubt of its magnitude, for Ceniza was days hence.
“Kaliga?” Kolak mouthed.
“Maybe worse,” Balagir said darkly. Kolak blinked.
“What could be worse?”
“Kaliga was in league with a kraelyn.”
“A what?”
“An ancient, extradimensional being.” Kolak’s face paled. An impressive feat for so swarthy a jaegir.
“But how could this be?”
“We’ve been duped, my friend. Plain and simple.” He did not mention by whom. No. Time to look for a solution; blame would not save them.
The sky directly above remained blue, the darkness contained within that swirling distant pillar. He drew Murdak’s old spyglass but could glean nothing new. It was the water, he saw, which was bringing the smell. The small waves that lapped up against the shore were speckled with black and grey, leaving a crooked line of ash along the beach. Boats of all shapes and sizes sped away from the spectacle, seeking sanctuary where they could. The guards at Kasker Harbour were already turning them away, so they were forced to anchor out in the bay or look for a nearby cove.
A familiar set of sails stood out in that jostling tangle.
“The Spite Spear is here,” Balagir said, striding forward, keen to question Res.
Denge, who had been at the start of his glorious retirement with Kolak, hurried over.
“No change,” he reported. “It’s been like that since it started. Do you know what it is?”
“It’s the end,” Balagir said, not wishing to belabour the point.
The docks were in chaos, with almost everyone heading in the opposite direction of them. Balagir dug his shoulder in and carved a path towards his former ship.
He became increasingly aware of hostile looks. It had not taken folks long to put two and two together, speculating that the ash cloud and the ashen might be related.
Matters were not helped when they reached the ship. Res still stood upon the deck, ensuring the hatches were battened, when Balagir’s attention was drawn to another voice.
“What have you done?” He turned to see Finster descending the gangplank, accusation raw in his eyes. Balagir could hardly blame him his suspicions. They had, after all, last been seen departing for the very island that now found itself the centre of such controversy.
“If it isn’t the mutineer,” Balagir said coldly. Finster snorted.
“If you’re referring to the fact I negated in joining you in your recklessness, then I would gladly be dubbed such. I have despaired of you many times, Balagir, but tell me this is not your doing.” Balagir shrugged. As much as he would have revelled in proving the treacherous ashen wrong, he simply could not. Finster threw his hands to his head.
“Do you realise what this means?”
“Why do you think I came?”
“You tell me. Is there more mischief to cause?”
“I come to put an end to this.”
“Oh, it’s already at an end. Have you seen the way the people are looking at us? Heard what they are saying?”
“And what exactly has changed? We’ve always been despised.”
“You’ve always been despised.”
“We’ve always fought against prejudice and suspicion. I’ve just given them a smidgen more cause.”
“Exactly what have you done?” He glanced back towards the black column and visibly swallowed.
“I’ve tried, that’s what. I’ve traced our origins, discovered our purpose, united us. What have you done, save backstab, betray, and connive? Were it not for me, you’d be hunted by the askaba now.”
“If that’s the result of our salvation, I fear it has been in vain. I’d rather an enemy I could stab.”
“Come,” Kolak said, intervening. “There are too many ears here. Let us retire to the shore; there may be a few taverns that are not completely packed.”
“That’s the first sensible thing I’ve heard from you,” Finster spat. Balagir nodded. They were being watched. Some of the guards were beginning to pay attention, and he didn’t like the way their fingers drummed at their hilts. Res still worked above, but Balagir chose not to implicate him further in matters of the ashen. It might not prove profitable for his ship. Later they would talk. If there was a later.
Keeping their heads lowered, the four ashen departed the docks and found a marginally more secluded spot along the foreshore; yet even here the terraces were packed with gawping folk unable to tear their eyes from the apparent apocalypse.
“I fail to see how anything you can tell me may shed this in a more favourable light. Still, I’m willing to listen.” Balagir looked surprised.
“Finster, willing to listen. Well, suddenly the end of the world does not seem so shocking.”
“You’ve got my attention, let’s just leave it at that. What have you discovered?” Kolak and Denge were regarding him with equal anticipation, and he found himself unable to sidestep as the mud crabs did the clumps of ash in their paths.
Deliberately he spelled out the bones of what he had gleaned. The dhaki, the hiilg, and the wand; their wayward protégés; the ashen and the askaba. He dangled the carrot of their childhood abductions but moved on before being bombarded with rhetoric. He spoke of Botswa and the kalaqai, shying away from the more damning revelations.
“You’ve been busy,” Kolak said, breaking the silence that followed.
“So that thing is a…” Denge struggled.
“A kraelyn? I think not. Not yet. But once Kaliga is out, we will be helpless to stop him completing his ritual. Jakan is nothing but a ghost, his music an echo. We’ve played our role as servants, stokers of the flames, but we’ve none of the old dhaki power.”
They turned their eyes back to the distant shadow, its sinister nature deepened by Balagir’s words.
“It isn’t getting any nearer,” Denge commented.
“It won’t,” Balagir said, realising in that instant why not.
The words came back to him. Opened a door. But to where? Suddenly he remembered.
“We must get to Eskareth,” he called over his shoulder.
“Why?” Denge pursued.
“That’s where the door leads.”
“I don’t understand. Are you saying the fire we created—”
He cut Kolak off. No point in denying it. “Opened a gateway. Yes. I rather fear it did.”
Finster slapped a hand to his head.
“I warned you not to go there.”
Balagir shrugged. “The only way of seeing a sunrise is by embracing the night.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, to be free—truly free once and for all—we must destroy our enemy, not ignore him. Were it not us, some future ashen would have arrived as we had. It was only a matter of time; our arrival had been long in the making.”
“And just how do we go about destroying that?” Finster asked incredulously.
“We’ll fathom that once we arrive at Eskareth. We must hurry; it may already be too late to use the hub.”
With these words of urgency, he stayed any further questions, and their pace through the crowds back towards Kasker fire was swift.
They had not crossed the square, however, when they were waylaid.
“Hold!”
They turned to see three guards in pale green livery approaching. They had come from the direction of the docks and were instantly recognisable as Silionese
“I’m afraid, gentlemen, we are pressed for time—” Balagir began.
“You’re not going anywhere,” the highest-ranking—as well as the burliest—of the three
said, hand on his sword.
“What is the meaning of this?” Finster demanded in a far from diplomatic tone.
“What do you know about that?” the guard asked, jerking his head towards the channel.
Balagir shrugged. “Why would you assume we knew anything?”
“Because.” And here the second guard, slightly smaller but no less menacing, ticked several points off on his stubby fingers. “You’re ashen, always up to your necks in mischief.” Next finger. “Some of you were recently seen fleeing from Silione, an island where you are not permitted, heading in the direction of Tempestua.” A final finger. “And ash is fluttering from the sky like black snow. Need I go on?”
“I take your point—” Balagir began, but the guard overshot him.
“Now, tell us where we may find one who goes by the name of Finster?”
Finster’s black eyes widened. He had not expected that.
“How did you come by my name?” The guards looked at each other, smiling grimly, and drew their swords. “Now wait a moment—” Finster began.
“Silence. Your crimes have too long gone unpunished.”