A black cavity sloped down into a pit where the deck should have been. At first they could make no sense of it but then Fern pointed and Carnelian saw the arch in the bottom of the pit with its individual stones and knew it was the exposed backbone of the monster. How fierce had been the inferno that had eaten its way down through decks and tank and flesh? The tower rose black and hollow like a chimney to the sky. Everything inside had been consumed.
Another doubled trumpet blast made them look south, but they could not see over the corpse ridge. Using the rigging, they clambered up the remains of the tower. As he pulled himself up onto the ledge around the topmost tier, Carnelian peered through a porthole. The command chair and the Master who had sat in it had fallen into the conflagration below. Using a guy rope, he pulled himself up the mast onto the narrow ledge that was the remains of the roof. There was just enough space for Fern to join him. It was only then they gazed out over the land. Dark ripples stretched away behind the first corpse ridge like those a tide leaves in sand. Here and there tiny dragons with their towers gave scale. Both stared, appalled, unable to comprehend how many dead there must be to make up such a landscape. A flashing in the midst of this carnage drew Carnelian’s eye. There upon the thread of road, a fire was burning. It died. Its smoke spiralled up, thinning into a haze, and he saw the dragon on the road and more behind it in a long column. The flame-pipes spoke again, the fire igniting against the road just before everything was obscured by naphtha smoke. At the root of that boiling black column, fire pulsed.
‘A signal,’ Carnelian and Fern said together. Carnelian looked further south and saw the ripples of the dead growing fainter and a scattering of ruined dragons like pebbles. He glanced east and saw a line of dragons there. There was another in the west. The two flanks of Molochite’s first line turned inwards, facing each other across the labyrinthine ripples of the dead and at its heart those flame-pipes signalling.
Sitting with their backs against the mast, Carnelian and Fern were frozen together like two blocks of ice. The rain pouring over them had drained their flesh of life, their minds of thought. Their eyes might have been glass as they gazed towards Heart-of-Thunder and Osidian. Who else could it be? In response to his signals, the two surviving wings of Molochite’s first line had exchanged communications by means of torches. As a result of all those firefly signals, a dragon from each wing had wound its way through the corpse labyrinth to meet Osidian on the road. By means of the torches their attendants lit, Carnelian and Fern had watched the commanders descend to the road and, there, in the shelter of Heart-of-Thunder’s belly, they had spent a long time, no doubt negotiating terms. After this the emissaries had returned each to his wing, where, after more torch signals, they had all moved south and had, a long while past, disappeared into the rain haze.
A light came suddenly from the west, shocking Carnelian and Fern to life. The curves and windings of the corpse labyrinth were thrown into sharp relief with a texture of piled-up fishbones.
A growl emitted from Fern’s throat brought Carnelian’s head up to see Heart-of-Thunder was turning. Shadows moved and melted upon his tower, and soon Osidian and his dragons were marching south along the road. Watching this, Carnelian felt a yearning to follow him, but as quickly as he felt this, he rejected it. He looked at Fern. For a moment his face seemed that of a stranger, but when Fern’s eyes came alive surveying the scene Carnelian’s heart jumped. It was then he determined that, come what may, he would share Fern’s destiny.
A bleak warmth upon his cheek made him turn to see the sun fallen beneath the ceiling of black cloud, already westering. Beneath its orb, the wheeled box of the Iron House was all burnt out. Imagining its oven horrors was not enough to deter his need to go there. He lingered for a while, examining without success the motives of his heart before he turned to Fern. ‘We must find shelter for the night.’ The words seemed spoken by a stranger. Fern was looking back at him, a question in his eyes. Then he must have seen Carnelian had no answers, for he shrugged. They broke their immobility with difficulty. Their limbs and backs felt stiff enough to snap off at the joints. Like old men, they began the descent to the earth.
The wreck loomed black against purple sky. Above hung the gory clot of the sun. They were weary from the long slog through the mud. Chilled to the bone by the rain, at first they welcomed the warm aura of the ruined Iron House. Until, that is, they began to smell its funeral-pyre reek. Half off the road it lay, like a ship run aground upon a reef. Carnelian imagined how it had happened. In pain and panic, the two blind draught dragons had pulled it off the road so that one side had tipped, a wheel rolling for a moment in the air before landing heavily enough on the earth below to buckle. In all, three dragons were piled up against the wreck like foothills. The nearest, having lumbered completely off the road, had avalanched down, shattering its forelimbs, plunging its massive head into the rubble of the demolished leftway. One of its lower horns had snapped off at the skull, from which a pool of blood had oozed. Its beak had buckled as it punched into the ground. Its rump and back formed a fleshy buttress crushed beneath the toppling mass of the Iron House. The second dragon had crashed down into bloody ruin and now lay slumped half on, half off the road. The third was one of Osidian’s that had been caught up in the disaster. Its head lay hidden, but by the way the body lay, it must somehow be wedged between the wheel still on the road and the further wall of the Iron House. The monster sloped up from its collapsed haunches, suggesting its head was lying upon the axle. Its tower, angled back, was blackened but had not burned, so that perhaps its crew had been able to abandon it. The same fire that had licked the tower had burned furiously upon the backs of the two draught dragons. The summits of their backs were black craters ringed about by ashen flesh. Charcoaled gashes and clefts cutting deep into the meat showed where the wooden housings and the yokes as large as bridges had been consumed in the holocaust.
It was the wall of the Iron House, sheer and forbidding, that showed the greatest damage. The same long line of windows through which Carnelian, crucified, had seen the sartlar approaching that morning – had it really only been that morning? – those windows were now nothing more than a ragged slit from whose fissured upper lip wisps of smoke were still hazing up. Above, the wall had blackened and thinned. Through the surviving sooty filigree, Carnelian and Fern could glimpse hideous cavities the colour of charcoal. The whole smouldering mass rose mountainously before them, its cliffs and clefts, its mounds and gullies running with sheets and streams and rivulets from the rain that glazed it.
Overwhelmed, they almost fell to their knees, overcome by weariness and horror, weighed down by the immensity of death they had already witnessed that day.
Carnelian took Fern’s shoulder and drew him away to where something lay embedded in the mud. A black bowl that either of them could have lain outstretched in, strangely contoured, filled up with water. Carnelian bent to touch it and brought his fingers to his nose. Iron. He unbent and regarded it, thinking it had a look of Osrakum with its lake. Then he realized it was Osrakum, or at least a representation of it. The iron hollow was, in form, a turtle. Looking round, he saw the wheel from which this hub cap had fallen. They approached it together, gazing up to see where the green arch of its bronze tyre had come loose. The ruin of the Iron House loomed over them. Their eyes fixed on the wheel. The end of the axle showed the cracks and rings of the vast tree it had once been. The red spokes radiating up from it were whole, but many of those below had shattered. The massive rim had cracked in two places so that it now folded in like lips of a mouth in which the spoke stumps were uneven teeth. Gold discs studded the rim, which Carnelian knew must represent the cities of the Ringwall. Gazing at this immense, broken wheelmap, then glancing back at the Osrakum hub thrown away, half-buried in the red mud, he could not help feeling this was some kind of omen for the Commonwealth.
As if speaking to him, another of the spokes snapped, causing the wheel to fold in on itself a little more. Fern pulled him away
as, with a hideous grating, the chariot slid towards them, shedding panels of iron. Stumbling, Fern fell with Carnelian almost on top of him. They gaped up. They flinched as panels clattered to the ground, right and left. Then the sombre stillness of the scene returned and the rain hiss. They rose, still gazing up uncertainly at the Iron House.
Fern was the first to walk away. Carnelian followed him, glancing at the bloody sky over the pale horizon formed by the edge of the road. Night was nearing: they needed to find a place to sleep. Fern was heading towards a strangely textured green ramp leaning up against the road. As Carnelian neared it, he became aware of the huge upside-down face embossed into the verdigrised slope of copper. The face smiled up at the black sky, surrounded by a halo of curls and spirals. He knew this thing. It was the Twins’ fallen standard. He remembered the hope it had given him that morning. He watched Fern reach up to touch its spiralled edge and, though he could not see his face, Carnelian saw the slump in the shoulders and dread rose in him that Fern was remembering the ferngardens of the Koppie. Fern ducked under the standard and disappeared into the gloom beneath it. Carnelian stood for a while, unable to focus his emotions. He glanced west, where the sun was making a bloody end to a bloody day, then he followed his friend.
In the cavern beneath the standard, Carnelian could hear Fern struggling for breath. Rain drummed upon the copper roof and some dim red light oozed in, but they were in a place separate from the world; safe from it. Listening to Fern’s struggle for air, Carnelian at first chose to believe it a reaction to all the death outside. He told himself he was too numb to care, but the sound was stirring up panic in him. He moved towards Fern’s barely defined shape, wanting, fearing to touch him. As he came closer, the sound Fern was making was like a cough, as if he were trying to rid his lungs of smoke. The strained wheezing was pulling Carnelian apart. He reached out. At his touch, Fern began sobbing. The grief in that sound sent cracks through Carnelian’s frozen heart. Each shudder in Fern’s body brought them closer. Carnelian felt his own grief spilling out, racking his whole frame. They collided and clung to each other as the grief overflowed. They sobbed for all their mothers, for all their fathers, for the children, for the Tribe and for love lost and the suffering of the world that was their own and for the dead forming the hills of the earth. Clutching each other so hard helped to squeeze out the poison and the tears. In the pressure of Fern’s arms, Carnelian felt he was being forgiven and he abandoned himself to forgiveness; forgiving all those others, forgiving himself. He was not the sky, nor the earth. He was nothing more consequential than a blown leaf. He was too small a thing to be responsible for all the suffering, to be the reason for it. The forces of the world shaped him; were not shaped by him. Carnelian drew Fern against him, wanting him to feel that too; feel the pain drain away. The heat in their bodies awoke a fire in them. Amidst so much death there was a need to assert the flame of their lives. For them both, it was a miracle to explore each other’s body by touch. The warmed brass around Fern’s neck. The scar about Carnelian’s. Fern’s fire scars. His four-fingered hands upon Carnelian. Warm tears on cheeks lubricated the turning of their faces to each other. Lips guiding them to that first kiss. The world forgotten. Breathing love names. Though Carnelian was the younger, it was Fern who was like a boy. They fell into their own joined flesh, both lost and found.
MURDEROUS GRIEF
Which mother can forgive the killing of her children?
(Quyan fragment)
CARNELIAN WOKE SUDDENLY AND, FOR A MOMENT, STRUGGLED IN THE riptide of the wave that was about to engulf him. Breath in his ear made him aware of Fern, warm in his arms. Thin grey light leaking in under the eaves of the fallen standard allowed Carnelian to see him. He gazed in wonder, remembering the night’s frantic lovemaking. With his eyes closed, Fern was as beautiful as a child and Carnelian was loath to wake him. He lay back, adjusting his spine, feeling the ache from having lain all night upon the unforgiving earth, his shoulder numb under Fern, but he did not care about the discomfort, only the delicious weight pressing down on him.
He became aware of the barrelling python of the Black God’s lower lip curving its grimace away off towards the eaves. He could see the curling rim of the upper lip, the nostrils, a suggestion of the glaring eyes. On the outer surface of the roof, rain was drumming on the Green God’s copper face. Carnelian reached his hand up to touch the metal. Its delicate vibrations transferred through his arm to his back, setting off the first shivers of the feeling from the sound of rain.
Reality seeped into his thoughts. A harsh reality. Osidian had survived the battle. Such a victory could only serve to engorge his mad devotion to his god. There was no hiding from him, nor could he hope to hide from him what Fern and he had become. Not that he would have tried to do so. The rippling shivering down his back became trembling for a moment as he feared what Osidian might do to his beloved. Carnelian wished he was confident he could protect him. Crazed notions of flight flitted through his mind. He dismissed them all as fantasy. In all the wide world, there was no place he and Fern could hide. Osidian would have to be confronted. Carnelian ground his teeth, feeling how deeply anchored in him was his determination to protect his lover, or die trying.
He tensed. The rain had stopped and he was certain he could hear the scrabble of aquar claws on stone. Already? Of course it was obvious Osidian must pass here on his way to Osrakum. Fern was still asleep. It would be better not to wake him until he knew what was going on. Gently, Carnelian pulled his arm free. Fern sighed, but did not wake. Carnelian sat up, grimacing at the ache in his back, pulling his arm across his chest, rubbing some feeling into it. His legs ached too and barely supported him as he rose, then tottered towards the triangle of light. Nearing this, his skin became so bright it forced him to squint. He glanced back and saw Fern lying brown in the shadow of the eaves. There was nothing with which to cover their nakedness. Carnelian cocked an ear to listen. The sound of claws had ceased. Was that a mutter of voices? He wished he had had the foresight to bring some weapon. If the Law still held sway, his face unmasked might be weapon enough. He dismissed a pang of guilt at the deaths he might cause. So many had died already, what were a few more? Was he becoming callous? He quenched his doubt by telling himself that none now could claim to be innocent of killing.
Keeping close to the side of the road, which rose like a wall, he edged out into the rain. He was already drenched by the time he reached the ramp that climbed to the road. He paused to listen again. He could definitely hear voices speaking with the lilt of Vulgate. By their tone they could not be Masters. Auxiliaries, perhaps? Whoever they were, it was likely they would be terrified by the sudden appearance of a Master. He could not imagine they would dare disobey him. He could get an aquar from them, perhaps two, and something for him and Fern to wear.
Vaulting onto the ramp, he began climbing it. As he came up onto the road, he saw three aquar turned away from him, their riders gazing up at the Iron House. For a moment he too was lost regarding its vast bulk, black and ominous against a grey sky. Then he raised his voice. ‘Attend me.’
The aquar whirled round, but it was Carnelian who was surprised: the riders showed no fear, but simply stared at him. He resolved one face and was shocked to recognize his House tattoo. Before he could see anything more, the aquar began folding their legs. Their riders sprang out even before the creatures had fully sunk to the road. One of the saddle-chairs had two riders, the smaller of which came running towards him.
His heart leapt. ‘Poppy!’
She stopped short, in some confusion, no doubt because he was naked. Two men with chameleons across their faces approached. He spoke their names: ‘Tain, Keal.’ Looking at the three of them, he acknowledged to himself that there was more to family than blood.
His brothers were unfastening their cloaks and, as they neared him, held them up. He allowed them to wrap him in one, while all the time they talked excitedly, Carnie this and Carnie that, but he was too stunned by their sudden appe
arance to be able to listen to what they were saying. When he was clothed, Poppy ran at him and he embraced her, laughing as joy came upon him that he was indeed among family. All of them were talking at once. They were asking him if the plan they had kludged together with Fern had actually worked; describing how frantic they had been when he too had disappeared; telling Carnelian what they had witnessed of the terrible battle; of the shock of seeing the God’s chariot burn; about the desperate hope that had brought them out from the camp that morning to seek for him and Fern among the wounded and the dead. Unable to respond to this flood, Carnelian beamed at them, until his smile caught on their faces and they were all grinning at each other like idiots.
He noticed a figure standing outside their group. It was Krow, gazing at him with an uncertain smile on his face, wanting to come forward, but unsure if it was his place.
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