by Ian Irvine
Tiaan shook herself and came back to the task at hand – to find a hiding place for the night. She had not thought any further ahead. If she had, she would not have dared come at all. What could an unarmed cripple do against a fortress full of lyrinx?
As soon as it was dark, she drifted the thapter towards a cluster of grey boulders, like giant’s juggling balls, that topped a hill a good league from the nearest part of the wall of Snizort. Trees stuck up between the rocks: stubble on a shaven head. It was slow and tricky work bringing the thapter down in the gloom, and Tiaan was sweating by the time she eased it in between the boulders.
She moved the thapter under the rocks and trees so it would not be visible from above. Taking out the amplimet, the diamond hedrons and their connectors, she wrapped all carefully and put them in her chest pack. Tiaan laboriously got herself into the walker and inserted the hedron. The field was strange here but it provided the necessary power, which was all that mattered. She covered the thapter with branches, such that only the most determined search would find it. A wedge of moon, falling towards the west, provided a ghostly illumination.
Now what? How could she find Gilhaelith in a nest of lyrinx? She had to try. Tiaan had heard horrible rumours about what the lyrinx did to spies. If they caught her, they would tear her apart, and if she went down there they probably would catch her. The very idea was madness.
But it was better than being trapped in this body with no hope of recovery. Gilhaelith might be able to free her. What peril would she not face, to have back the use of her legs? She would go down and see what she could discover, and if a lyrinx did attack, well, it would be a merciful release. At least, she tried to tell herself that. It did not lesson the terror.
Tiaan crept, insofar as the walker could creep, through the scrub. The way down would have been perilous even in daylight, for the hill was capped with a broken layer of sandstone that ended in a cliff a couple of spans high. There was no way she could get the walker down that; however, after circumnavigating the summit several times, she found a crack in the stone that took her to a gully she was able to half-walk, half-slide down.
As the walker’s rubber feet sank into the moist earth at the base of the cliff, Tiaan wondered how she would ever get up again. Well, she’d worry about that when she returned – if she did.
A path meandered across the slope and she turned onto it. When it levelled out near the bottom of the hill, she was confronted by a squat-bellied figure standing in a glade. It was just a statue, though an unpleasant one: a bulbous belly, head so narrow that the model must have been bound at birth, and a face that the slanting moonlight showed to be cratered with pox scars. More striking was the fixed, repulsive leer.
Tiaan shivered and passed by. Whoever had made it was long gone. The path ran into another, an animal trail that might also be frequented by hunting lyrinx. The wall of Snizort was an hour’s walk from here, through thorny scrub and low forest. She had a feeling that someone was behind her, watching; waiting. Her anxious glances revealed nothing, though a small creature skittered into the bushes as she turned the corner.
After negotiating a network of trails, she emerged in cleared land and saw the wall about a bowshot ahead. It looked some four spans high and was thick enough to support an impenetrable tangle of thornbush at the top. A beaten path ran around the base, presumably where sentries walked. Tiaan felt such a premonition of danger that she almost turned and fled. What stupidity had brought her here?
A shadow flickered in the deeper shade at the base of the wall. This was it. It must see her. She dared not move. It stopped and seemed to be looking in her direction. She thought she caught a glint from its eyes.
Tiaan fingered the crystal rod, knowing it probably would not work, since Gilhaelith had not taught her how to recharge it from the field. Another gleam, then the shadow moved off. She edged back into the scrub. The lyrinx sense of smell was not particularly keen, but it might pick up her scent.
Though Tiaan watched for a long time, she saw no sign of life. Close to midnight, judging by the moon, she turned back. Before she had gone far, the moon fell behind the thornbush wall and it became too dark to see. Tiaan cursed herself for not thinking of that.
Taking a rough bearing from the stars, she headed east, feeling her way forward, and found what seemed to be a track through the scrub. Shortly it came out near the wall again. Continuing along the edge of the cleared zone, she encountered a broad path. To her right, the setting moon streamed through the barred gate of Snizort. Apprehension growing, she headed the other way and collided with a broad figure standing quietly in the darkness. It moved into the light. The moon shone on rows of teeth, glittered in its eyes, revealed its lack of wings.
‘I knew you’d bring your crystal back one day, Tiaan,’ said Ryll.
She hurled the walker sideways but Ryll thrust out a limb, one metal leg caught and the walker crashed to the ground. Her head struck the frame so hard that she saw stars. She lay still. There was nothing she could do.
‘Why are you in this machine?’ he asked, crouching beside her.
‘I broke my back. I can never walk again.’
Ryll’s crest glowed pink as he lifted the walker. ‘I feel your pain.’ His clawed hand closed about her wrist and he thrust his big jaw at her.
‘What are you going to do with me?’ she said hoarsely.
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘Is Gilhaelith here?’
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘The man you travelled across the world to mate with.’
He could still embarrass her. ‘No, that was somebody else.’
Ryll looked taken aback. ‘The other man did not want to mate with you?’
Perception, or a lucky guess? ‘He betrayed me,’ said Tiaan bitterly.
‘I am sorry,’ said Ryll, and Tiaan knew he spoke truly. She had not known Ryll to lie, yet he was not, when the situation required it, averse to making misleading statements.
‘Gilhaelith?’ she repeated.
‘The tetrarch is here.’
‘What do you mean tetrarch?’
‘Isn’t that what you call him?’
‘I call him Gilhaelith. Is he all right?’
‘He has been treated well, though he does not appreciate it as he might. You won’t try to escape, will you?’
‘I’ve come a long way to find him.’
‘As you did for your mate, and he betrayed you. Your loyalty is stronger than your judgment.’
That was certainly true, much as she hated to be reminded of it. They went through the gates, which were guarded by dozens of lyrinx, bearing weapons she could not make out in the gloom. The passage through the wall was an arched tunnel. Inside, the area was dimly lit by flaming bowls the size of cartwheels, set on stone pedestals. Fumes from burning tar drifted across the ground in black wisps and strands. The air reeked.
‘This way,’ said Ryll.
She followed him along a path, trodden to black tar, that wound through thorny shrubbery. Tar bogs shone ominously in the light of the flickering lamps.
‘What are you doing here, Ryll? Are you still flesh-forming?’
‘It is not my place to tell you such things, Tiaan.’
‘You never caught the nylatl, did you?’
‘We never did. It disappeared.’
‘It killed some good people. I only knew them for a day, but they had become friends.’
‘I bitterly regret that I created the beast.’ He was much more subdued than before. He seemed, in some strange way, cowed.
‘Liett begged you to kill it.’
‘I should have listened. I have much to answer for.’
They walked in silence until they came to the edge of a cliff. At least, that was her first thought, though after they turned onto the sticky steps Tiaan understood that it was one of the pits excavated into the tar-saturated sandstone. In the failing moonlight it looked like a pool of ink.
‘I can’t walk down steps,’ she said.
He picked her up, walker and all, and headed down. Tiaan closed its legs so they would not catch on anything. The steps went halfway around the huge excavation but she could not see them. It was eerily dark. The air reeked of tar; the fumes were making her sick.
‘How can you live down here?’ she said. ‘It would kill me.’
‘You’ll see.’
Ryll turned left, stooped and bore her into a tunnel through the black sandstone. They went along for ages, his feet making tearing sounds on the sticky floor, and through a series of doors. The tar smell faded. Finally they passed through a metal door where Tiaan felt a flow of fresh air, and began to go up again. The rock here was orange sandstone, so soft that it could be excavated with a mattock. There were lights at intervals, lanterns hung on hooks in the wall.
‘Not back there,’ he said as if reading her thought. ‘The risk of fire is too great.’
They passed small open chambers on either side, looking rather the way she imagined an ants’ nest to be. Many contained young lyrinx, playing at games rather like human children. Beyond, Ryll led her into an oval sandstone chamber, carved out by hand.
There were many lyrinx in it, standing around, sitting at benches, or bent over plans or documents. Tiaan recognised none of them. She saw humans too, pale-skinned creatures who appeared to have never seen the sun. Though not manacled or restrained in any way, they had the listless look of slaves. Most were young, none older than middle age. Down the far end of the room stood a tall, dark-skinned woman with frizzy hair and filed teeth – a native of the forests of Crandor. She stood by a large piece of slate, making marks on it while three half-grown lyrinx attempted to reproduce them on smaller slates.
‘We teach our brightest children to read and write your common tongues,’ said Ryll, noting her interest. He urged her forward.
On the other side of the room, a man was reciting while a group of young lyrinx attempted to speak the words back to him. He waved his arms in the air and they fell silent. His left hand was missing.
‘My tutor,’ Ryll said. ‘He has served and taught us all my life. He is the best teacher I know. We are almost friends.’ He waved and the man raised his stump.
They continued into another room with a green-crested guard on the door. She allowed them through into a large space crowded with lyrinx. Ryll made a piping whistle and they turned as one. He spoke in his incomprehensible tongue, of which all Tiaan recognised was her name. Everyone stared at her, their skin flashing in lurid, chameleon colours. Tiaan had never learned to read their skin-speech, but it was evident that they were excited. A massive female embraced Ryll, then one by one the others touched him on the shoulder.
Tiaan’s skin prickled. She had an overpowering urge to run. Run anywhere, as fast as her legs …
Ryll bowed to his fellows and led Tiaan out.
‘What are you doing here, Ryll? Snizort is a long way from where we first met.’
‘We are great travellers, Tiaan, but as it happens, this is my home. I lived here until I became a man. Snizort is now our most important city on Lauralin.’
‘Until two days ago I had not heard of it. Is this where you learned to speak our language?’
‘Yes, from infancy. Some prisoners have been here since before I was born.’
‘When were you born, Ryll?’
He named the year.
‘But that means you’re only fourteen,’ she cried.
‘That is correct.’
‘I thought you were an adult.’
The skin of his feet and hands went a pale yellow. ‘We are adults at the age of ten. Most lyrinx my age have been mated long ago. Those who are whole and have wings. Unlike me.’
Just before Tiaan had fled Kalissin, it had seemed that Ryll and Liett might be mated, despite their respective disabilities. ‘Is Liett here too?’
‘She arrived but two days ago.’
‘Are you a pair now?’
His brow wrinkled. ‘Do you mean, has she accepted me as her mate?’
‘Yes.’
‘She has not. There have been difficulties.’
‘I thought, er, just before I fled Kalissin, that you and Liett were … close.’
Colours flickered across his face. ‘The Wise Mother withdrew her permission and sent me home in disgrace.’
‘That must have hurt you.’
‘I am a fool!’ Ryll said harshly. ‘As well as a wingless wonder. I must take my punishment.’ He said no more.
On they went; and down again. It was warmer here. ‘Can I see Gilhaelith?’ Tiaan asked miserably.
‘No, you cannot. We have arrived.’
Ryll thrust open a round door made of wood and ushered her inside. Helping her out of the walker, he sat her on a bench which ran the length of the curved wall. He put her pack beside her, lifted the walker onto his shoulders and turned to go.
‘Ah!’ He turned back. ‘One last thing.’
‘Yes?’
‘You will give me the crystal.’
There was no choice. Unfastening the chest pack, she put the amplimet into his leathery hand. What would the lyrinx make of it this time? Would they see its strangeness?
‘Thank you.’ The door was slammed and bolted on the outside.
Tiaan lifted her legs onto the bench and closed her eyes. She had tried it all for nothing and now they were going to use her again. This was the stupidest thing she had ever done. Ryll was right about her lack of judgment. Why, why had she come?
Several hours went by before Ryll carried Tiaan to another place, many winding tunnels away, that she would have had trouble finding on her own. She did her best to memorise the sequence of turns, in the faint hope that, one day, there might be a chance to escape.
It was a dim, moist room, long and wide, with an earthy, peaty odour. Mist wreathed across it, though after some time she made out rows of objects that brought to mind the mechanical devices in the manufactory, except that these looked as if they had been grown of wood and bark, branch and leaf, bone and horn and shell. Each was different in size, colour and form.
She felt something shuddery creeping up her back. ‘What are these things?’
Ryll carried her along a row to the second-last object, a throat-high cube of a substance that resembled woody leather, though covered in bulbs and curving indentations. Along the sides were patterns like veins in leaves and gills in mushrooms. A faint spicy odour, like lemony pepper, masked something less pleasant.
‘Sit here, please.’ Ryll put her on the floor and bent over the cube.
Tiaan tried to see what he was doing. He seemed to be removing a cover; testing the level inside. Something went glop! An ominous liquidity.
Across the room, vapour hissed from a dark aperture. A cloud of mist drifted toward the cube.
Ryll stood over her. ‘Take your clothes off, please.’
‘What?’ she cried, her heart thumping.
‘Remove your clothes. You won’t need them here.’
‘Why not?’ she screamed. ‘What are you going to do to me?’
‘I’m not going to do anything to you.’
Her eyes flicked back and forth. Her skin felt as if hairy caterpillars were swarming on it. ‘No!’ she gasped. ‘You’re monsters. I won’t help you again.’
‘Take your clothes off, Tiaan, or I will have to remove them for you. I’m sure you wouldn’t want that. I know how … prudish you are.’
She shook her head.
He sighed. ‘I have the amplimet, Tiaan. I can force you.’
‘I got over withdrawal at Tirthrax. It means nothing to me now.’
‘We’ll see. Just what did you do there?’
‘I opened a gate from Santhenar to Aachan, so the Aachim could bring their constructs through. They’ve come to wage war, on you.’
He frowned. ‘We have more skilled questioners than I, Tiaan. They will get the truth from you.’
He did not believe her. That was good.
‘Your clothes! Hurry up!’
> ‘I won’t!’ She folded her arms across her chest.
Ryll bellowed. A small lyrinx came up the row and Tiaan recognised her too. Her thin, translucent skin and the magnificent, colourless wings distinguished her from every other lyrinx. Liett had never liked Tiaan.
‘Take her clothes, please,’ said Ryll.
Liett, recognising Tiaan, roared with laughter. ‘What’s the matter with her?’
‘She’s broken her back.’
The smile vanished. Liett examined Tiaan, then pulled Ryll away and spoke rapidly to him in their own tongue. Tiaan could read his expressions well enough to know that he was troubled. They debated for some minutes, after which Liett began to strip her.
One hand sufficed to hold Tiaan while the other deftly unfastened her coat and shirt down the front. Soon the boots, trousers and underwear had gone the same way.
The lyrinx looked her up and down. ‘What pale, helpless creatures you are without your clothes. Shall I put her in?’
‘Be quick!’ Ryll looked ill-at-ease.
Liett lifted Tiaan in one hand, her useless legs flopping back and forth, carried her to the cube and poked her feet into the top opening. The surface resembled gnarled bark dotted with brown nodules like wooden eyeballs. The peppery smell grew stronger, as did that other, uncomfortable odour.
The cube contained a thick yellow-brown mass. Liett let Tiaan go and she slid into it. It was cool with the texture of jelly, and rose to the level of her armpits. It felt horrible, clinging but slippery. Her skin began to tingle.
‘What are you doing?’ she cried. ‘What is this thing?’
‘You might call it a patterner,’ said Ryll, putting the amplimet around her neck and adjusting it so it hung lower, between her breasts.
‘It is going to pattern you,’ said Liett with a toothy smile.
‘No!’ screamed Tiaan, and kept screaming until the patterner next to her began to shudder and quake.
Tiaan saw an eye looking at her. Two eyes; another woman, no older than herself. The woman’s eyes went wide and she began to scream, a higher, more shrill sound than Tiaan’s. The same thing happened on the right.