by Tim Lebbon
The stringy tail flexed slightly, shifted, and started to unravel. It turned around and around, its coil becoming wider, and while the nut remained in his palm, the tail stretched out over the side of his hand and grew strong and straight parallel to the ground. When it finished growing and changing it was as long as a person’s arm.
“One of the Core’s greatest witches made these,” he said. “A charm, a spell, a wish, and a series of words tied up in a moment of time. Every Core member has taken a vow allied to those charms, and every single one will hear its call.”
“How many are there?”
Kel shrugged. “Perhaps three hundred.”
“Against this?” Namior gestured out at the island, thought of the ships sailing in and docking, and the man dressed in a metal skin carrying the steam weapon. And she wondered if perhaps Kel was mad.
“The Core will bring an army.” He placed the tip of the tail against the ground between his feet and pushed.
Namior was amazed. The plantlike stem pressed between two pebbles and pierced the ground, sliding in smoothly as Kel pushed down with little effort. At the point where its whole length entered the ground was a drizzle of sparks.
“I never thought I’d see you using magic,” Namior said, and even after everything she managed a smile.
“I haven’t used it yet,” Kel said.
What if he can’t? What if the interference stops that as well? But Namior could not think like that. Whatever angle the Core’s witches used to approach magic must surely be mindful of such problems.
Once the nutlike object was pressed close to the ground, its long stem deep in the land, Kel knelt and used the Stranger’s weapon to crush it and send the signal. That was poetry in justice, if ever Namior had seen any.
The nut shattered, shards of it speckling her feet. Kel stood up and backed away.
“What now?” Namior asked.
He frowned and shook his head.
The nut issued one thin tendril of bluish smoke, then its shattered shell rose rapidly from the ground, carried up by the stiff stalk. Once clear of the ground it fell sideways and shattered across the rocks, stem breaking into a hundred pieces as if made from the finest blown glass.
“Even this,” Kel said, and his face fell.
“It didn’t work?”
“No. Interference, your family called it. I call it poisoning. The Strangers are here, and they’ve poisoned the magic, made it easy for themselves. And this …” He held up the tube, examining it more closely. “This is their magic. And it doesn’t rely on some vague language that few people know.” He threw the tube down and kicked it away. “It doesn’t need witches to chant, or a drawing of power, or Practitioners to run it. All it needs is steam.” He stepped forward and kicked the tube again, sending it clattering across the beach toward the sea. “Steam! And how that fucking Stranger back there didn’t kill me, I’ll never know.”
“There’s room for luck in any belief or religion.”
“Luck?” He was shouting, though his rage was directed outward across the sea, not back at Namior. “I feel so lucky now, that’s for sure. I’m the luckiest Core member in Noreela right now! Here I am, at the heart of everything I’ve been trying to escape for five years. Right at the center of things, the place and time the Core has been agonizing about and fearing for hundreds of years. And what? I’m on my fucking own!”
“You’re not on your own.”
Kel looked at her, and his eyes were watery. He wiped at them and came to her, glancing around as he did so. They were still alone on the beach.
“This is so dangerous,” he said. “This could be the beginning of the end, and …” He held her shoulders and looked intently at her face, as though trying to imprint her image on his memory.
“I’m not leaving you now,” Namior said.
Kel nodded, went to say something, then turned and looked out at the island.
“We could go back,” Namior said. “Try to get past them, go inland to where the magic might still be working.”
“They could have done this everywhere.”
“We should find out!”
“Back through the Throats?” he said.
“It’ll take time, but—”
“No,” Kel said. “Out there. To the island. They’ll be expecting people to flee inland, and they’ll have set up guards to prevent it. We might get past, but if we don’t and they catch us… well, we know for sure they’re looking for me now, at least. But out there is the last place they’ll expect anyone to go.”
“And maybe your signal will work from the island.”
“Magic?”
“The Strangers are doing something to it. But if they truly don’t use or even have magic, why do that same thing on their own island? And their island is in Noreelan waters, now.”
Kel grinned. “You’re a genius, Namior Feeron.”
“Glad to help, wood-carver.”
He seemed about to speak again, but he glanced past her at the cave, face growing grim.
“I’ll help.” Namior thought of the corpses she had run across, the feel of them giving underfoot, the smells and sounds …“Two will be quicker than one.”
She expected him to protest, but he only nodded. And whatever it was he wanted to say, he kept inside for another time.
THE STRANGER’S METALLIC shell was twisted and distorted, and in places it seemed to have melted and re-formed in strange, fluid shapes. His body was all but gone, and a foul-smelling smoke rose from what was left. Namior saw smears of soot around the tunnel’s wall and ceiling from where the Stranger had… ignited? Exploded? She was not sure exactly what had happened, and it was not the time to ask.
Namior Feeron walked across the bodies of dead friends to help those that were still alive. That was what she kept telling herself, at least. She ignored the sounds and smell and concentrated on the faces of those she loved: her mother and great-grandmother; Mell, searching for Trakis, digging against hope; Mourner Kanthia, so brave and vulnerable even though most regarded her as too close to death to be comfortable. And Kel Boon, the wood-carver who had turned out to be a soldier as well. And it was the “as well” that kept her eyes on him, the realization in all the confused, intense moments that he was still the man she had fallen in love with. The wood carving, the move to Pavmouth Breaks, had not been falsehoods on his part, nor the attempt to hide from whatever had happened. It was perhaps the most honest thing Kel had done. He was a soldier, but he was still a wood-carver and her lover as well, and as long as that remained so, she would be there to help.
Kel climbed past the boat and picked up one of the oars she had used to strike at the Stranger. He wedged it beneath the hull, tested the flexibility of the wood for a beat, then shoved.
The boat slid free, scraping across rocks then sliding onto the corpses.
Namior pulled, eyes half-closed. She concentrated on the sound of the waves behind her, timeless and familiar. She had been born with that noise in her ears, and every moment of her life so far had sung to the same tune. When at last she felt cold water lapping around her feet and pouring into her boots, she opened her eyes again, felt the sun on her face where it had just cleared the cliff, and climbed into the boat.
Kel pushed it out past the breaking waves, then jumped into the bow. He and Namior sat side by side and took an oar each. The swell toyed with them for a time, rocking left and right, but they eventually maneuvered the boat so that the bow pointed out to sea. Then they started rowing, cutting through the breakers and finding the gentle swell of the ocean, and watching the cliffs as they slowly fell behind.
The impact of what they were doing suddenly struck home. But Namior did not stop rowing. The exertion felt good, the perspiration on her back and beneath her armpits was cooled by the breeze.
“We’ll be back,” Kel said.
“You can’t say that.” A mile to the north, Namior saw the Komadians’ ships at dock before the mole and inside the harbor. She hoped that from that
far away, their rowboat would be indistinguishable from the waves. But with magic distant to her, there was nothing she could do to camouflage them.
“I can!” Kel said. His certainty shocked her, and she did not reply.
They rowed on, the boat lifting and dipping in perfect rhythm with the great sea. As more time passed, so a greater stretch of the coastline was presented for their view. Namior could see scars on the land where the great waves had struck, but the damage was starting to feel more remote. It was only beats since they had left land, but it already felt like days.
“We’re rowing somewhere else,” she said at last. “We’re leaving the whole world and going somewhere else.”
Kel was quiet for a while, and she thought he was not going to answer. But then he stopped rowing. Namior stopped as well, and when she looked at him they were close enough to smell each other’s breath.
“We could be the first from Noreela ever to set foot on another land,” he said.
Namior surprised Kel, and herself, by laughing out loud. “They’ll write songs about us!”
And to the tune of the sea, and the rhythm of the oars, Namior and Kel made their way to somewhere new, and terrible.
Chapter Eight
somewhere new
WHEN THEY PAUSED for a rest, Kel seemed unsure of which way to look: back toward shore, to see whether they were being pursued; or out at the island, revealing itself in more detail the nearer they drew. So he sat beside Namior, shifting view every few beats. He said nothing, so she assumed there was little to say. She knew that would not remain the case for long.
She dangled her ground rod in the water and closed her eyes, opening herself to the language of the land. What little she heard was confused. A vague shred of what she knew came through, but it was lessened by a terrible, growing distance. She attempted a light spark, the simplest feat of magic she could think of, but even that did not manifest.
“Nothing?” Kel asked.
“The closer we get to the island, the farther away the magic becomes.”
“Your shoulder.”
She touched the wound where the Stranger’s throwing star had hit her, shook her head. “It’s nothing. Your hand?”
Kel held up his left hand. The blood was clotting, the gash in his palm ugly but no longer bleeding.
“We should start rowing again,” he said. They did, and though the currents seemed to be nudging them southward, Kel did nothing to correct their course. The sea carried them away from the direct path between the island and Pavmouth Breaks, and though they could see no boats traveling between the two, that could change at any moment. If they were spied out there, there would be no escape. Namior did not think Kel could hold his own for very long against a boatload of those metal-clad Strangers.
Though her arms and legs were already starting to burn with the strain, Namior found the rise and fall of waves and the rhythm of their rowing soporific. All her life spent in a fishing village, and she had been out to sea only twice. Both times she’d not enjoyed the journey, and soon into the second trip she’d been sick. Fighting nausea and tiredness, determined not to let him down, she started talking to Kel.
“The Stranger, that metal armor. Have you seen anything like that before?”
“Never the armor. But the Stranger inside, yes. They’re people, but they have…Well, it’s strange. Gills on their necks. And those long things on their backs, like limbs or tentacles. We think they use them to communicate. They always reminded me of beetles.”
“I’ve heard about armor,” she said. Talking helped; the nausea was dwindling already. And she sensed that Kel knew more.
“Nothing like that, though. I’ve seen militia on the borders of the Poison Forests wearing armor of sorts, but it’s heavy, unwieldy. That looked almost …” He splashed his oar in hard, taking out his frustration on the sea.
“It was like he was made of metal,” Namior said. “I thought that’s what it was when we saw him. A metal man. One of their steam machines.”
“Finely crafted, for sure. The joints were smooth; he could move well. Almost as if the suit was aiding him.”
“But you still found a way in.”
“Yes,” Kel said quietly. Three oar-dips later, he continued. “I think that was a lucky strike. Wedged between two plates, and when he turned his head aside, it pulled the sword in. Lucky. That’s all.”
Namior stopped rowing. The boat turned slightly, and Kel backed water to keep them bow on to the waves.
“There might be hundreds of them on the island.”
“We’ll look from a distance,” Kel said. “I’m not stupid, Namior. I’ve been doing this for a long time. I know how to be quiet, what to look for. I’m trained.”
She looked at him, seeing the man she loved and the man she had never known, and both of them stared back.
“So, the Komadians? The Strangers? Who are they?”
“The people I’ve been waiting for all my life.” He nodded at her oar, and they started rowing again.
“Maybe the Strangers are just their soldiers,” Namior suggested.
“That’s what I’ve been thinking. And if that’s the case, the armor shows they’re readying for a fight.”
Namior’s sense of adventure was quickly being overshadowed by fear. She had always wanted to travel, but her witch training had kept her at home. Not too long, her mother had said several moons ago. A year, a little more, and you’ll be ready. But training half-finished can be dangerous. A witch knows from her ancestors what magic can do, and if you’re left with only that knowledge, and not the ability, it can torture you. So stay, be here with us while we tell you all we know. And then, if you must, you can go.
Why didn’t you go, Mother? she had asked. And your mother, and her mother as well? There must be so much to see out there!
We did, the woman had replied, surprising her. Namior had always imagined her family as bound to Pavmouth Breaks by unbreakable ties. The thought of them traveling, seeing the vastness of Noreela… it had opened her mind, but also unsettled her.
But you came back?
Her mother had smiled then, nodded, and looked across the harbor from where they sat. When you see so much of the world that your sense of wonder becomes bruised, and your hunger for more lessens, home is always the best place to be.
Namior had been unsure of what that meant, but rather than lessening her desire for travel, it had made her more ravenous.
At last the wider world was revealing itself. And it had teeth.
The sea lifted them gently up and down. Ahead of them, the sheer cliffs receded; the narrow beach at their base was little more than a white line of breaking waves. Along the shore to their left, Pavmouth Breaks lay nestled in the mouth of the River Pav. The damage was evident from there; areas of the village built on the hillsides were defined and sharp, while those close down to the sea appeared smudged and indistinct. The spikes of several large ships grew from the sea outside the harbor. They were too far away to see movement, but the village seemed dangerous to them, not like home at all. Namior squinted to try to make out her house, but they all blurred into one.
Kel rowed in silence. He was frowning, and he kept glancing over his shoulder at the approaching island. Namior could almost hear his mind working, and she kept quiet for a while, giving him space to think.
Her fear for herself was matched by fear for her family. What she and Kel were attempting was painfully dangerous, but her mother and great-grandmother were at home in Pavmouth Breaks, still under the illusion that the visitors were benevolent. At least she and Kel knew the truth. They had come to Pavmouth Breaks, and they were building something beyond the village. The eventual outcome could not be good.
“There are settlements along the shore,” Kel said. “High cliffs, and low beaches. We’ll go around the southern tip, see if there’s somewhere more remote to land. Let’s just hope the tide and currents don’t carry us out to sea.”
“Oh, thank you,” Namior said.
“How comforting.”
“Well, at least if they do, you’ll have your desire for adventure satisfied.”
“I’m rapidly starting to reconsider.”
They rowed together, shoulders and arms touching now and then, and Namior realized just how grateful she was to have him with her. They were heading into danger, but Kel had been there many times before.
THE CLOSER THEY drew to the island, the more nervous Kel became. He rowed while trying to look behind him all the time, and his neck and shoulders ached. He was waiting to be seen, watching for the ominous signs of sails being raised and boats launching to intercept them, and for the first time in his life he was afraid of the sea. The sea’s depths became apparent; if they had to jump from the boat and swim, they would have no idea of what might be lying in wait below. The water could be a dozen steps deep, or six hundred. He had seen the prints of a sea wolf in the muddy harbor, and a disaster so great, washing scores of dead out into the sea, would bring many more carrion creatures. He’d heard countless tales of sea monsters over ales in the Dog’s Eyes, but until then he had regarded most of them as myth.
His weapons felt heavy around his body, but they were tied well. They made no sound. He had O’Peeria’s influence to thank for that.
The island was a rugged place, its haphazard coastline made up of jagged cliffs, steep inlets and low, rocky beaches. He could see signs of small settlements spotting the coastline, but Kel hoped that the farther they went around the southern shore, the more remote landing places might be available. It was hardly a plan, but it was all he could come up with just then.
He wondered what O’Peeria would do in such a situation, and he answered that thought in her voice: Go to the island, find the bastards’ weaknesses, then contact the Core, however the fuck you can.
“You’re sure we’re doing the right thing, Kel?” Namior asked, not for the first time.
“Yes,” he said. It was not the time for uncertainty.
Their little boat drifted farther south, and it started taking on water. He had been noticing it for a while, how the sloshing water in the boat’s base was slowly growing deeper, but he’d shut it out. One more thing to worry about. At last, it was becoming obvious.