by Ian Irvine
In a couple of minutes she was settling on the slab, which was partly covered in the splattered remains of a fallen swamp creeper. Near the flame hole the stone was stained with blood: hers, Phrune’s and Vivimord’s. She shivered at the memories. How long ago had Phrune attacked her? Six hours? Eight? Ten? She felt quite desperately tired. There was no time to waste. If any soldiers came in, she would be clearly visible.
Don’t think about what happened earlier. Just recharge the crystal and get going. She gave the rope three sharp tugs. Maelys popped out the shard, which was glowing fiercely now, passed it through the loop of wire and pulled it tight. What if the force of the flame could travel up the wire? She pulled her sleeve down so no part of her skin would be in contact with it, then gingerly reached out to the flame.
Nothing happened, save that the dancing colours in the shard brightened. It’s all right, she thought, her arm shaking. I can do this. And last time it hadn’t taken long to charge the whole crystal. She’d held her shard in the flame for the count of thirty. It must be nearly that long now – long enough. She daren’t take the risk –
Bang!
The shard burst into a thousand flying fragments; one stung the back of her hand. She picked it out and sucked at the tiny drop of blood welling there. Their last source of power was lost. All was lost. Why, why hadn’t she been more careful?
SIX
Maelys was about to give Colm the signal to haul her up when she noticed a coating of little crystals, like spilled sugar, around the star-shaped hole through which the cursed flame issued.
Crystals were everywhere, of course – rocks were full of them – but even in the days before the nodes were destroyed, crystals capable of storing power for use in the Secret Art had been rare and precious. They were far rarer now, and finding one was as difficult as searching through the myriad grains of sand on a beach for one lost jewel.
And yet … the cursed flame had charged Flydd’s fifth crystal quickly, so even an ordinary crystal might absorb some power after being bathed in the cursed flame for hundreds, even thousands of years.
She studied the sugary crust of yellow sulphur surrounding the star hole, but these crystals had no glow. Besides, they could not be bathed by the flame or the sulphur would have burned – every apprentice healer knew that. To find crystals bathed by the flame she would need to search beneath the slab.
Dare she? Flydd had said to come straight up if she failed, but she had to make up for bursting the shard. She had let him down and her failure would only confirm the contempt Colm felt for her. Unfastening the harness from her waist, she slid over the edge of the slab, avoiding the congealed puddle of Phrune’s blood, and crawled into the space beneath the slab. Here the floor was scattered with flakes of Vivimord’s skin, for Phrune had dragged his master underneath so Maelys’s blood, purified by the cursed flame, could heal him.
She brushed the skin aside with her sleeve and crawled up to the flame, which hissed from a crystal-encrusted crack in the floor. These crystals were different, being long, thin, and blue-green, but all intergrown. She prised carefully with the point of Zham’s knife but the brittle crystals broke every time.
Rolling onto her back, she studied the underside of the slab. There were more such crystals inside the star hole, but she couldn’t reach them without putting her hand into the cursed flame. However the underside of the slab, around the hole, was covered in squat pink crystals condensed from the flame; she could see their facets twinkling.
Squelch!
What was that? Maelys eased her head out from under the slab, thinking that she’d been seen. Why, why had she untied the harness? She was about to spring up for it when her eye caught a faint movement from the chimney above – flame reflecting off the mucosal sheen of a moving swamp creeper.
Feeling like a fool, she resumed her search. Most of the pink crystals were the size of grains of rice but there were occasional larger ones, as big as kernels of corn, a few of which had faint colours swirling within them.
It didn’t mean that they contained usable power, but Maelys couldn’t go back up the rope empty-handed. She scanned the underside, not for the biggest crystal, but the one with the brightest colours.
It was only as long as her little fingernail, though the colours were intense. She touched the tip of Zham’s knife to the rock above the crystal and it fell into her hand. The moment she put it in the taphloid, it came to life, suppressing her aura the way the taphloid had been designed to. So the crystal did contain some power.
Squelch!
She eased out, looked up at the chimney, but didn’t see any movement this time. Better get going; Flydd would be anxious about the time. Maelys put her hands on the top of the slab and tried to spring up, but her feet went from under her and she landed flat on her back. She’d slipped in Phrune’s congealed blood, and that reminded her of something she should have remembered the moment she’d landed on the slab.
She rolled away, her hackles rising. Previously, Vivimord had dragged Phrune’s body underneath, then stood on the slab, cut his own chest and let his blood flow into the cursed flame in a despairing attempt to revive his acolyte. But it had failed, and Phrune’s body had still lain under the slab when Vivimord staggered off to confront Jal-Nish.
There was no sign of the body now – someone had been here before her. Jal-Nish’s troops might have dragged Phrune out, but they would hardly have carried his disgusting body away. Only one man would have done that – Vivimord.
Was he here still? She couldn’t see anything in the deep shadows. Heaving herself onto the slab, she reached for the harness.
Squelch!
The sound had come from her right. He was waiting for someone to come to the flame, the only source of power here that Jal-Nish did not control. Vivimord and Phrune had despised each other, yet they were linked by terrible needs which only the other could satisfy, and until the day of her death she would not forget Vivimord’s parting words.
You’ll pay for this, Maelys Nifferlin! I know Black Arts that can make a corpse scream in agony, that can torment even a bodiless spirit and cause lifeless bones to chatter in terror. You’ll pay and pay, and keep on paying a hundred years after your agonising death.
Had he been talking about the spectral beings inhabiting the shadow realm? More than ever she did not want to go there. Her sore fingers fumbled with the knots of the harness as she looked over her shoulder. Vivimord could be anywhere, and there was no point calling for help, for the soldiers they’d encountered earlier must have been his men, not Jal-Nish’s. Besides, Flydd, Colm and Nish would hear nothing through the clots of swamp creepers blocking the chimney.
Having checked that her harness knots were secure, she reached up and gave two sharp tugs on the rope, but it stayed slack. She signalled again; it was not answered. That dreadful squelching sounded once more, she looked around frantically, then out of the darkness it came.
In the dimly flickering flame she couldn’t tell what it was at first. It was man-shaped, though it did not move like a man. It had a slow, stiff-legged, shuffling lurch, and every movement was accompanied by squelching sounds, as if something liquid was sloshing back and forth.
Maelys caught a glimpse of a round, waxen head punctured by blank eyes; the mouth was a bloated circular orifice with something long and dangling jammed in it. It looked like a man who had choked on the head of a squid, with its tentacles hanging halfway down his chest, flapping from side to side as he moved.
The cursed flame flared, the creature stepped out of the shadows and she nearly wet herself. It was Phrune’s ghastly corpse, its intestines hanging out of its mouth. He had died that way after Maelys, in a desperate attempt to save herself, had thrust her taphloid through his lips and its contact had inverted his aura violently. But no one could have survived what he’d been through. His corpse must have been reanimated by Vivimord’s Black Arts.
‘Colm?’ she squeaked.
Why wasn’t he pulling her up? Had they
been discovered; taken; killed? She tried to climb the rope but it was so slippery she couldn’t get a grip. She gave it a furious heave and another span or two slid down – she hadn’t pulled hard enough the first time; hadn’t drawn down all the slack line trapped between the swamp creepers. Colm hadn’t got her signal.
She pulled the rope down until it went taut, then heaved hard, twice, and twice more. Dead Phrune had covered half the distance between them already and the sight of him filled her with a sickening, paralysing horror. Come on!
She gave the signal again and finally the rope began to move up, though several spans of slack were pooled on the slab and Phrune was only five spans away. She unsheathed Zham’s huge knife, the size of a short sword in her hands, and held it out.
The corpse gave a squelching choke – laughter? – and more white loops of intestine flopped out. She waved the blade back and forth, but how could she harm a man who was already dead?
The slack was being taken up more quickly now; perhaps Colm had realised that something was wrong. The corpse reached the edge of the slab and reached out for the last coil of rope. Maelys kicked it out of the way and slashed at the waxen-pale forearm. The tip of the knife parted grey flesh but he did not bleed.
The corpse slipped in its own congealed blood and fell against the side of the slab. Plump fingers gripped the edge; the gluey eyes fixed on her and he began to climb. As Maelys backed down to the other end, the rope tightened around her waist and began to lift.
Phrune was on the slab, straightening slowly, but as soon as her feet lifted off she began to swing towards him. She would thump into him, couldn’t stop herself, and all he had to do was hang on.
‘Pull, damn you!’ she screeched, for Colm wasn’t lifting her nearly fast enough.
She bent forwards, holding Zham’s blade in both hands like a spear, and pointed it directly at Phrune’s eyes. If she could cut them he might not be able to see … though he could still grab her blindly.
She was swinging at him from his right. He shifted to face her, which meant that he could see. His arms rose; he was going to duck the knife and grab her, and she was moving too slowly to avoid him.
She whipped the knife back, doubled up her legs and as dead Phrune came within reach she shot out both feet like springs and struck him on the jaw.
His head jerked backwards; his arms flailed and he nearly overbalanced, but his left hand struck her ankle and latched on. She kicked furiously but he would not let go. She swung around him on the rope, then struck at his wrist with her other foot and tore free, kicking Phrune again and again, hitting him in the back of the neck and the shoulders, knocking him to his knees, until the swinging rope carried her away.
Colm jerked her higher; she was now head-high above the slab as Phrune regained his footing and came at her. Another jerk and she was above his head. He reached up and his putrid fingers grazed her ankle, but could not get a grip this time; she slashed with the knife, only managing to trim his long nails before another heave lifted her out of reach. Colm had done it. She was safe. Maelys sagged on the rope, barely able to see for the tears of relief.
She hung there, limp and exhausted as Colm pulled her up another half span. Phrune’s arm jerked upright, his plump fingers pointed at her waist, and she felt a tickling at her middle, as if invisible fingers were working there – the knots were untying themselves! She tried to hold them together but the harness was already undone. The rope burned through her fingers and she fell heavily to the slab at the corpse’s feet.
Phrune lunged for her. For an instant Maelys was too stunned to move, then desperation fired her limbs and, as his oozing intestines trailed across her chest, she hurled herself onto the floor and scrambled around the other side of the slab. The rope had stopped moving up; Colm had noticed the weight go off it and must be waiting for her to tie on again.
If she could distract Phrune, she might just scramble up, grab the rope and hang on while Colm lifted her out of reach. She’d have to be quick, though. Unfortunately, the corpse wasn’t moving; Phrune was just waiting beneath the rope. Her gaze flicked around the large chamber. The cursed flame illuminated it for a few spans, beyond which the shadows became progressively deeper.
Spying a scattering of precious amber-wood pieces on the floor from her previous visit, Maelys scooped up half a dozen and tossed them into the cursed flame. It flared up, illuminating the chamber for a good twenty spans. The corpse lurched away from the flame but the moment it died down Phrune resumed his position, guarding the rope.
The taphloid had done him terrible damage before – might it still hold some power over his remains? It was worth the risk. Turning away, she took it off and concealed it in her left hand, the chain wrapped around it for security. Maelys crept in, waving Zham’s knife in her right hand. The corpse slowly rotated to face her. She slashed at his knees but he didn’t move; whatever intelligence had reanimated him, he knew she couldn’t harm him with a blade.
Let’s see how you like the sting of my taphloid, she thought savagely, then darted in and slammed it against Phrune’s pale calf, which was chest-high to her.
The corpse didn’t react save to tilt its head to stare blindly at her. Of course – being dead, it had no aura, so the taphloid could not harm it. Nothing could, save hacking it into immobile pieces, and she could not risk getting that close.
Wait! When the flame flared, Phrune had lurched out of the way. Could he fear the fire, or was he repelled by the precious, sacred, lucky amber-wood that had saved her last time?
She sheathed the knife, pocketed the taphloid, and gathered all the amber-wood she could find, tossing it into the flame, which roared higher than Phrune’s head. The corpse moved backwards, trying to shield its eyes with its hands. It was her only chance.
She vaulted onto the narrow end of the coffin-shaped slab, took two running steps and leapt high for the rope. Phrune hadn’t moved.
Maelys wrapped a loop of rope around her wrist and drew her legs up out of reach, hanging on grimly as she waited for Colm to feel her weight and start pulling her up. He did so, jerkily, but to Maelys’s horror the rope began to slip across her palms. It was coated in swamp creeper slime, and though she squeezed until her hands began to cramp, she wasn’t strong enough to hold on. She was slipping, faster and faster, until she slid off the end and landed on the slab, right over the flame.
It only stung this time, though she could feel the paralysis from the cursed flame creeping upon her, slowly this time; perhaps it was still partly affected by amber-wood. The corpse came her way. Maelys threw herself off the far side, intending to bolt into the gloom, but her legs had gone numb from the knees down and all she could manage was an awkward stumble. She hadn’t gone far when two long arms wrapped around her and held her tight.
‘We have the bait,’ crowed Vivimord. ‘Now to set the trap.’
SEVEN
Nish moved in the darkness, bumped his burned hand against the side of the chimney and bit down on a gasp. As the moss bandage dried the pain was growing ever stronger, and he didn’t think he could take much more of it. Even worse, there was no feeling in his last three fingers; might he lose them, or even his whole hand? He was beginning to think so.
Colm was on his left, the taut rope looped around his right hand so he would sense the smallest tug. Flydd was on the other side, murmuring a rhyme, trying to recover his lost Art.
He broke off. ‘How’s your hand?’
‘It’s troubling me a bit, but I’ll be all right,’ Nish lied. ‘During my time in father’s prison I learned to be stoic.’
After a while Flydd said quietly, ‘That bad, eh? If I could find a trace of my Art, I’d work a healing charm.’
Talking about it made the pain harder to endure. ‘Thanks,’ Nish said curtly. ‘How are you getting on?’
‘A few memories are coming back, though my flesh still doesn’t fit my bones.’
‘It takes days to adjust to a new pair of boots,’ said Colm. ‘You can’t
expect to feel at home in a new body in a hurry.’
‘One of the reasons why I’d always refused to take renewal.’
‘Still,’ said Nish, ‘many people would kill to be young again – well, middle-aged, anyhow.’
‘Some people will kill for a few coppers,’ Flydd sighed. ‘I have to admit that, despite my protestations, a part of me did want renewal, after nine years in a failing body. I knew it would either kill me, thus solving all my problems, or make a new man of me. In a way, I’m glad I was forced into it – but don’t tell Maelys I said that,’ he added hastily.
‘What about the third possibility?’ said Nish.
‘That I’d survive but be damaged? I ignored it, and the irony is bitter. I could have endured any physical agony more easily than I can accept the loss of my talent. Mancery has been my life and soul, my Art and Science, my work and play, but most of all it has been the crutch which has held me up through every one of life’s crises since I first began training in the Art as a small boy. I don’t think I can cope without it.’
‘It may come back,’ said Colm.
‘I wouldn’t bet on it.’
After a long pause, Nish said hesitantly, for few mancers liked to be questioned and Flydd was no exception, ‘Xervish, a while ago you seemed to remember something puzzling about your renewal. And you mentioned a woman dressed in red.’
‘Xervish?’ Nish repeated after a minute or two had gone by and Flydd had not answered.
‘I had a strange, strange dream,’ said Flydd. ‘It was after using the third crystal – or was it the fourth? The fire flared up oddly –’
‘Fires flare all the time,’ said Colm.
‘Not peat fires, when they’re nearly out. Though mine was no ordinary fire.’
‘What do you mean?’ Nish said uneasily. Whenever he thought he knew what Flydd was talking about, he introduced some new oddity.