by Anne Brooke
Binding it to the strength of the remaining words, he plunged himself and the cane into the heart of the killing mist. Something inside it twisted away from him and he sensed a kind of submission but it was not enough. The story he held in his thoughts, the secrets and truth behind the words of the others, and his father were somehow not enough. He needed more.
How the Lost One had hoped it would not come to this, but his own fears and dreams were unimportant in the face of this cruel onslaught on what they held as precious. He swept the mind-cane in a perfect arc in front of him and the resulting swift flames gave him a respite he could tumble through, back into the harshness of the rough flooring and the reality of the wintry air. He blinked and reached out with his mind to find the one he was seeking. Surely Ralph would make the story complete. He had to.
At the same time, his father’s consciousness battered against his own once more as the old man tumbled against him. For a moment, he had no idea what was happening, and then he sensed Jemelda framed against the terrible whiteness behind her. She was holding a jagged stone with both hands high above her head and he didn’t need to be any kind of mind-dweller to know her intent.
Jemelda
This time, she was sure of herself. The appearance of the mist was strengthening her thoughts and even her very life seemed to be blended with the universe within her. She could hear the screaming and how those around her, both friend and enemy, were dying or trying to escape. But to where she could not guess. The mist was all around and within and would not let them go till its deadly and wonderful purpose was complete.
Your time is now, trust yourself.
And she found she did. Reaching out, she touched someone – she thought it was Thomas but couldn’t be sure – and used his body to thrust herself in the direction she had last seen the murderer. With her other hand, she bent down and scrabbled at the floor. This house was a poor one and there would be something there for her purpose. Her heart beat fast at the thought of it. Sure enough, as the right herbs make the dish sing, her fingers found rough stone and grasped it. It was heavier than expected but she had the strength of two women, one dead and one living, to lift it.
She took two steps forward and then heard the old man, the murderer’s father, scream. The murderer must be with him but for what reason she could not tell. Then she saw the scribe. He landed heavily in front of her as if he had suddenly arrived from a great distance and a long journey. His face was pale and his eyes shone with terror. The voice had been right. Now was her time, their time. Before the man could recover himself, she lifted the stone high and began to bring it down upon the murderer’s head.
From nowhere, someone else stepped in front of her, someone thin and grey-haired, his eyes wild with a strange knowledge she couldn’t comprehend. The murderous scribe disappeared from view, the old man pushing him away from her attack. But it was too late to do anything to stop herself, the blow was already in motion. With a great cry, she brought the stone crashing down on flesh and bone. She heard a splintering sound and then a gurgled moan, cut off suddenly. The next moment something warm and wet splattered over her hand and face and she couldn’t help but gasp. The taste of blood in her mouth, iron and bitter. She prayed the blood was the scribe’s.
Then she heard his voice.
Simon
“Jemelda.”
Simon felt his father die, his mind ripped from his fragile body in one overwhelming flood of deep colour which was there for a heartbeat and then no more. The physical contact between them as his father’s body lay sprawled on top of him plunged the sensation deeper within his thought so he would, he believed, never be free of it. He tasted blood in his mind before he felt it on his lips and the mind-cane tumbled away.
“Jemelda,” he gasped, somehow dragging himself to his knees, clasping his father’s body. “What have you done?”
Her only response was to lunge for the stone again, her deep fury driving her onward. The next target would be himself. Simon could not have let go of his father if he had tried, but he grabbed for the stone anyway, as far as he could see it in the mist. His fingers touched its rough surface and then slipped away as Jemelda got there first.
Even though she couldn’t speak, he could hear the words in her head: This time, this time we will succeed.
She raised the stone above him and began to bring it down towards his head. Whatever happened, he could not move fast enough to escape her. And the cane was out of reach.
Annyeke
She could hardly breathe, couldn’t form a thought, the only image in her mind being that of Johan. She had to get through this, she refused to leave him. Annyeke Hallsfoot, First Elder of Gathandria, would not die here, and neither would those she’d brought with her, as far as she had the power to save them. When the whiteness fell amongst and within them, Annyeke had felt her words wash away, along with those of the people and all she had left were the pictures they held in their thoughts: war, storm, and winter fields.
One image within was almost stronger than all, only Johan being more deeply ingrained inside her. She could see a woman’s hands and a stone dripping with blood. Dread flowed through her, the need to do something to stop whatever was about to happen forcing her forward though she could see nothing. Then in the middle of the screams and terror, she heard it: the clatter and fizz of what must surely be the mind-cane falling to the floor. She ran towards it. It would lead her to the Lost One.
The next moment, she could sense Jemelda reaching for something out of her vision. There was blood everywhere, she could smell it, and prayed it wasn’t Simon’s. Jemelda raised a stone high, her thoughts clouded with anger and crimson triumph.
Before she could fully assess what she was doing, Annyeke snatched up the mind-cane, hissing with pain as fire tracked through her skin, and brought it sweeping across Jemelda’s back. The cook screamed and the stone fell from her hands. As Jemelda too dropped to the floor, Annyeke could see the searing flame lining her back. Then the mind-cane’s rage at her own possession of it overcame every thought and she cried out.
Simon was there in an instant, his face shadowed and his hands covered with blood but she understood it wasn’t his.
Let it go, Annyeke, let the cane go.
She couldn’t. It was impossible, but she couldn’t find the mind-words to tell him. Her palm was wide open but the cane was melding to her skin and flesh, its power raging through her, shattering her thought from the inside. It would swallow her up and she would be no more, she knew it. Simon.
The Lost One’s name was wrenched from her lips even before she understood it was there. He was holding her burning hand. Let it go, Annyeke. For if you die, how will I face Johan again?
Always his humour in the face of darkness. How she had seen that in him but no laughter rose up inside her now. Instead the picture of Johan filled her every sense and she could see the door to survival Simon had opened for her. When she gasped, the mind-cane rolled from her fingers and landed with a movement like silk in the Lost One’s hand.
At the same time, Jemelda’s frame loomed in front of her. The stone was back in her hands and the fire on her body had vanished. In her mind, Annyeke could see the cook and someone else also. The essence and hatred of Iffenia, the dead wife of the Chair Maker, dwelt indeed within Jemelda and, together, the two women were strong enough to fight again. To fight and to win. Annyeke tried to cry out a warning, but no words came out. The terrible pain in her flesh was the only feeling she knew before the darkness fell around her.
Simon
Annyeke fainted as the skin on her hand boiled with the cane’s deep fire. Simon cursed his anger out but the mind-cane’s touch seared a warning into his mind that the First Elder had tried to give him.
He twisted round, and saw Jemelda, and that other woman within her also, as she lunged across the ground to kill him. He had a heartbeat only to make a decision and he made it. He thrust the mind-cane towards her, his intent true, and it pierced the skin of her chee
k and onwards into her throat. Flame and death went with it and Jemelda screamed again. The sound of her cry ripped through him, along with the sudden dousing of her mind, and then she and the other spirit she carried with her was gone. As if they had never been at all.
It was then the mist around them began to sing. Simon had no time to react to the fact he had killed Jemelda, although the face in his mind for a heartbeat only was Frankel’s, and then he heard Annyeke. Not with the ear, but only in his thought: Help us, Lost One, or we will surely die.
He brought the cane back to his body, feeling the heat and heavy beat of death upon it. He had never used the mind-cane for such a purpose before and he wished never to do so again. Now he would use it for life. At the same time, someone landed at his side with a groan, and fingers clutched at his arm.
Ralph
Only the emeralds keep his mind fixed to his body, and maintain his surely useless fight against the force stealing his words and his memories away, piece by piece. The one thing he understands is the battle will be with Simon. The scribe has always been a storyteller, even when he is not writing, and if this airborne enemy is taking away Ralph’s words, then it will surely deem Simon’s as more important. Ralph will fight to the end not to allow this to happen.
So he clutches the emeralds and forces his way through to where instinct tells him the scribe will be. It seems to take forever but it can only in truth be a few moments when his thoughts begin to spark with the scribe’s nearness. A flash of black and crimson fire and he sees Jemelda outlined against the whiteness, her mouth framed in terror as she screams. Then the sound ceases, and Ralph lunges towards the source of it, where Simon must surely be. His hand touches warm flesh and he groans with the relief the contact gives him.
Simon. The scribe’s name in his mind is the only one he knows, and he can’t even remember why he has been so desperate to reach him, or what the rounded shapes in his other hand are, but they are linked. They have to be. But how can he tell the scribe what he should know when he cannot access it himself?
Simon
With Ralph’s touch, the Lost One knew exactly what the Lammas Lord longed to tell him. The picture in his mind was as clear as the sun: Ralph and the emeralds, both of them offering him the last word he needed to complete his story.
What is it? he asked, making the link to Ralph complete by grasping the man’s hand. Give me the word you hold.
But Ralph was beyond reasoning, and his thoughts were shattered by the mist. Simon could glean nothing and was terrified to cause more damage by entering the Lammas Lord’s mind himself. That way might kill him and he would cause no more death this day. Not if he could help it.
There had to be another way. But what? The answer came to him along with Anneyeke’s mind-cry: it is over. Help us!
But not yet, not yet was it over. There were still heartbeats for them to live. Because the Lost One grasped Ralph’s senseless hand, took the emeralds he found there and ripped their master’s word they had kept safe all this time from their bright mystery: desire.
Ralph’s word was desire. Simon’s mind swallowed it up, and in it found his own once more: acceptance. As both words pierced his thought, they joined with those of the people and created a multi-coloured circle in which everything was born, dwelt and had its being. A place where there was no silence but only perfect song, no dissent but only a harmony which came from the air and the earth and the sky. The colours danced with the music, and Simon thought he had never experienced anything so perfect, and knew he would never afterwards be able to describe it to his satisfaction. Within the circle, pulsating most strongly with green, the words lived to the full: expanse and grief, despair, mistrust, anger, bitterness, all of these alongside loyalty, trust, hope and love. Binding them together were acceptance and desire.
It was nearly enough. The white mist spat at the circle but could not enter it. Neither did it vanish and when the story had finished, the silence would remain to destroy them. An instinct deeper than words drove the Lost One to his feet, clutching the mind-cane. As he heard from somewhere within the long and distant cry of the snow-raven, he glanced down at Ralph and saw the Lammas Lord’s hooded grey eyes fixed on his own. He was still there then, somehow.
With a great triumphant cry, Simon the Lost One swung the cane once more through the dancing circle and the words within. Fire sprang from the silver carving and the words flew towards and inside it, forming something far greater than themselves and far greater than Simon had ever known. As the brightness and the flame melded into his flesh and thought, he knew this time his actions were for life, not death, and he understood this was good.
Then the darkness of pain swallowed him up and he could sense no more.
Chapter Seventeen: The Music of Words
Annyeke
One moment a chaos of silent destruction whirled and beat around and within her, the next the overwhelming pounding which lanced Annyeke’s mind ceased and she felt her thoughts begin to unfurl once more. And with them words: words of memories, words of present truth and future imagination. She almost sobbed aloud at the relief of knowing herself again. When the pain of loss was at its worst, she had looked up, and seen the Lost One in the middle of a circle of green, words singing from inside it, singing through him also. She thought she recognised her own word, and then the circle exploded into the mist. It was then the mist vanished, and her world came back.
She fell to her knees, gasping, and desperately trying to assess the injuries, or worse, of the people around her. As she reached out with her mind, her eyes were still fixed on the Lost One, and she cried out a warning as he too fell, his face expressionless.
“Simon.”
As he dropped to the ground, Annyeke saw behind him the looming figure of the blacksmith, the crimson of hatred and revenge swirling round his head. The knife in Thomas’s hand flashed silver in a sudden burst of sunlight through the clouds, and she opened her mouth to cry out again. But Simon was beyond hearing and she was too far away to help him. She could not bear the thought of her friend dying again and cursed her own helplessness. Please help him, she prayed, fearing the pointlessness of it. Please help him.
Ralph
He has nothing left, or that is what he believes. Simon has the jewels and, as for Ralph, he is spent. This day-cycle he cannot be the soldier he needs to be. The scribe must save them from the silence which has no end, if anything can. Then the darkness falls.
Time-cycles stop and he cannot tell whether he has been here for a second or a season, but the blackness within does not fade to white, as he is expecting. Instead, it seems to take a breath he cannot take and in which he cannot, though yes he tries, lose himself. From nowhere the darkness pierces his ears and he flinches as words come hammering into his head: Simon. Please help him, please …
It is the voice of the Gathandrian elder which tears his mind from its would-be rest. He cannot tell how she has contacted him but the anguish in the tone spins him into action. Simon? He must not die, he cannot do so.
Instinct and anger power the Lammas Lord to his feet. When he opens his eyes, he sees the grim face of the blacksmith from the village. He is standing over Simon’s senseless form, knife raised high, in the act of striking a man who cannot fight back. Ralph cries out and launches himself at the blacksmith. He knocks both of them off-balance, away from any danger to Simon. The blacksmith yells out and Ralph doesn’t need to be a mind-sensitive to understand his purpose. This is battle and there can only be one end to it. As the blacksmith turns the knife on him, Ralph grabs his fighting arm and with one blow twists the weapon away. It falls to the earth and both men lunge to grasp it. The blacksmith gets there first, but Ralph’s blood is up and he kicks the knife out of the man’s reach. This time, Ralph is nearer and he seizes the weapon. The blacksmith is already upon him, hands reaching to his throat and in any other circumstances Ralph would be the loser. But today the gods and stars are with him and he has already turned the blade towards his ene
my. The blacksmith lands on the knife, the point of it breaching his chest and shattering his heart. The force of his assault brings the whole weight of him down on Ralph’s body, but blood spills from the blacksmith’s mouth and a moment later he is no danger. Ralph hears his own ribs crack, and pain streaks through him as he is drenched in another man’s blood.
Before he faints, he hisses at the blacksmith who can hear nothing, but Ralph is honour-bound to say it. “Do not kill the man I have pledged to protect. You are a fool to try so.”
Then the darkness returns to him but this time it is different and somehow comforting.
Annyeke
This time, she knew it, the battle was truly over. The mist vanished and she could see the world again. It was not her own world, but she was nonetheless glad it looked as it should. That, at least, was something, though in itself not a sight which heartened her. The Lammas village lay in ruins, only one or two houses remained standing.
Ignoring the pain in her hand, she made her way as swiftly as possible from person to person, checking if any were alive and if so what she could do to help them. For the time it took to begin one of their ancient legends, she was the only one conscious, perhaps because her mind-skills were greater and the blood flowing within her was full-Gathandrian, and she had to hold back tears at each death she found. How this grief had risen amongst those who had already drunk their fill of suffering. She wondered if she could have protected them but she could not see how. She had been here, during this battle, and for their sakes she was glad. But for herself she could not be glad, as nobody should have to face this scene without companionship. Every step pulled her to the earth, it seemed, with each discovered death a failure and each man or woman she found still breathing a small success. She started with Simon, and found him not dead, thank the gods and stars, but as pale as a winter stone. With her unscarred fingers, she hunkered down on the side furthest away from the mind-cane and dared to stroke his hair. It did not wake him, but she could feel his thoughts coming to terms with what had taken place, and with his own part in saving them. Words hummed beneath his skin and they made her smile, but briefly.