by Paul Stewart
‘It is an insult,’ spat Blue Slake, ‘to the keld mistress!’
At the head of the table, the black-cowled figure of the keld mistress raised a velvet-gloved hand. ‘The farmers will be punished,’ she said quietly.
The three keld turned to her, their eyes glittering with eagerness.
‘Punished?’ said Cutter Daniel, licking his lips.
The eel-mother’s chins wobbled as she caressed the limbless crevicewyrmes round her neck, and beside her Blue Slake the poisoner gave another slurfing laugh.
The keld mistress nodded, and the voice that came from the faceless blackness beneath the hood was soft and honeyed. ‘It’s high time we paid Deephome a visit,’ she purred.
Thirty-Seven
The small greyish-green wyrme scritch-scratched across the stone floor on needlepoint claws. It paused by the tall earthenware jar with the peeling parchment label. Dripping water had left the words Pickled Linefruit smudged and barely legible, and corroded the jar’s wax seal.
Micah’s eyes narrowed. He was seated in the store chamber on an upturned crate, repairing his boots. He had been busy tacking and gluing the sole of his left boot back into place when the tiny creature had poked its pointed snout round the corner of a shelfstack.
As Micah watched, the wyrme sat up and sniffed the air. With its emerald crest raised, it jumped up onto the lowest shelf and scuttled along the row of earthenware jars until it came to the one with the damaged seal. Then, oblivious to the fact that it was being observed, the wyrme reached up and thrust a bony arm through the wax lid. It snatched a glistening yellow fruit, clutched it to its chest and scampered away.
Micah smiled. It wasn’t just the grey-cloaked Deephomers who ate well through fullwinter, he thought.
The previous night, he and Cara had eaten glazed sweetmeat pie, thick with gravy, which they’d mopped up with hunks of freshly-baked buckwheat bread. The mood had been happy and relaxed, Cara laughing and looking into Micah’s eyes with that twinkling look of hers, almost as if daring him to take her in his arms and kiss her in full view of the other Deephomers. But Micah had held back, as he always did, and suppertime had been charged with delicious anticipation.
As the weeks had passed and their feelings for one another grown stronger, Micah and Cara had taken to leaving the eating chamber separately, then meeting up later in secret. Every night, Cara would steal into Micah’s sleeping niche and curl up next to him, smelling of crushed myrtle and roseblush … Afterwards, Micah would drift into a deep sleep, and wake up refreshed and contented, only to find that he was alone, for Cara always left him before the earliest risers stirred.
Unlike every other aspect of life in Deephome, where each action was observed and each conversation overheard, the relationship between the two of them had been kept hidden. And Cara intended to keep it that way: at least until Micah put aside his weald clothes – the boots, the breeches, and the hacketon that Eli had made him - and donned the red hat and grey cloak of a Deephomer. Her father would never accept him otherwise.
But last night’s supper had not been like all the others …
Micah tested the boot. The glue had set and the thick sole seemed bonded to the leather uppers. It would need proper stitching with wyrmegut if it was to hold fast on the trail, but it would do for now. He pulled the boot on and, climbing to his feet, turned to go.
‘There you are, Micah, lad,’ said Eli. The cragclimber was standing by the shelfstack eyeing him levelly. ‘Good to see you’re keeping your kit in good repair. Come the thaw, you’ll have need of it.’
Micah nodded. He didn’t have the heart to tell Eli he was now no longer sure he wanted to leave Deephome when the thaw came. He wanted to stay here. Where it was safe. With Cara.
He frowned. ‘Have you seen Cara, Eli? I haven’t seen her since supper last night when …’ He paused.
‘When what, lad?’
Micah saw that Eli was wearing his thick leather jacket, belted and buckled and buttoned to the throat, and knew that the cragclimber was on his way to the stockade steps to stand and look out into the fullwinter blizzard that had been raging for days now. He would often stand at the stockade, and Micah knew that the cragclimber could not wait to leave the confines of Deephome.
‘Oh, it was nothing,’ he said. ‘It’s just that brother Kilian didn’t look happy with Cara last night.’
The events of the previous night were playing on Micah’s mind. He and Cara had been about to leave the eating chamber as usual, with Micah going one way and Cara going the other, when her father had surprised them. He had loomed over them, his tufted eyebrows knitted together with concern.
‘You look flushed, daughter,’ he’d told her, and pressed the palm of his hand to her forehead.
‘I’m fine, Father,’ Cara had said. She’d attempted to pull away, but Kilian had held her head still with his other hand, and maintained the pressure on her brow.
‘Don’t argue with me,’ he’d said, and there was a hard edge to his voice. ‘Your temperature is higher than it should be. And your eyes are glittering. You have a fever.’ He’d glanced round at Micah, his gaze penetrating, and Micah had felt as if Kilian held him to blame. ‘You’d best come with me, Cara.’
‘Oh, but Father …’
‘Cara,’ he’d said, his voice cold and clipped, and he had leaned forward and whispered something in her ear that Micah could not hear, and Cara had nodded and climbed obediently to her feet. Then the two of them turned and went, leaving Micah feeling suddenly isolated and unhappy.
What had Kilian whispered? Had he discovered that Cara had been spending her nights with him? And if so, what should Micah do?
He’d wanted to ask Eli for advice. But the cragclimber hadn’t been there at table. His friend kept to himself more and more as he waited for fullwinter to pass and, as Micah and Cara had grown closer, Eli had become more distant. And Micah missed him: his company, his terse conversation, his advice …
That night, Cara had not come to his sleeping niche, and Micah had slept fitfully. She was not at breakfast either.
‘I did see her,’ Eli said, turning up his collar and heading off towards the stockade steps. ‘Earlier. She was with a couple of others. They were on their way to them thermal baths of theirs.’
‘Th … thanks,’ Micah called after him as Eli stepped outside.
He set off in the opposite direction, walking quickly, but with his head down and avoiding eye contact with the Deephomers he passed. He hurried quickly through the meeting chamber and down the dimly lit tunnel that led to the cave containing the hot spring. Entering the steamy cavern, he heard a low murmur of voices that seemed to be coming from the shadowy recesses on the far side of the empty pool. He ducked down beneath one of the stone benches, his heart thumping.
Through the drifting steam, he could just make out two figures, one seated, the other standing with his back to him. The seated figure spoke.
‘Is that enough yet?’ It was Cara’s voice.
‘Just a little more, daughter.’ Kilian’s voice was low and reassuring. ‘It’s for your own good. The weakness will pass, and when it does, you’ll feel calmer, you know you will.’
Micah wanted to jump up from his hiding place and confront the prophet, demand to know what was going on. But something about the hushed tone of their voices suggested to him that this was something private, something intimate between father and daughter, and that he should not intrude.
‘There,’ said Kilian at last. ‘Now I shall bind it and the wound will soon heal. You have been a dutiful daughter, Cara, and have obeyed without complaint.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I hope you will not disappoint me in other matters,’ he said, and he paused, as if to let the words sink in. ‘Now, you rest there a moment while I see to this.’
Kilian turned and walked across the cavern. He was holding a bowl in his hands, taking care not to spil
l its contents. But as he passed the bench, some of it trickled over the side and dripped to the floor. Micah stifled a gasp.
The bowl was full to the brim with blood. Cara’s blood.
As the prophet’s footsteps receded down the tunnel, Micah rolled out from beneath the stone bench and leaped to his feet. He ran over to Cara, who sat slumped on a narrow alcove ledge, leaning back against the smooth stone wall behind her, her eyes shut. She was barefoot and wearing a cotton underslip with thin straps over her slender shoulders. It had droplets of blood on it. A bandage was wrapped tightly round the top of her right arm, and several bloodstained linen towels lay at her feet.
‘Cara, are you all right?’ Micah asked, kneeling before her.
Cara opened her eyes and looked at him blankly for a few moments, then smiled weakly. ‘I’m fine,’ she said, but her voice was frail and hoarse.
Micah glanced at her pale arms. What he had taken for accidental nicks and scratches in the lampglow of the sleeping niche, he now saw were fine white scars, the result of deliberate and calibrated cuts. He reached out and gently touched them.
‘Cara,’ he said softly. ‘What are these?’
Cara pulled her arm away, and hugged it to herself with the other. ‘It’s nothing,’ she said, and when Micah frowned, his eyes fixed on hers, she looked down. ‘It’s for my own good,’ she whispered.
‘Your own good?’ Micah said, his voice louder than he’d intended. His cheeks flushed and his scalp prickled hotly at the thought of the sharp blade slicing into her soft delicate skin. ‘How is cutting you meant to be for your own good?’ he demanded.
Cara sighed, and a faint smile played at the corners of her eyes, as though the answer was so obvious he was foolish even to ask. Yet she couldn’t meet his gaze.
‘Cara?’ he said more gently, and he took her hands in his.
Finally she looked up, and Micah felt something tugging inside him as he stared into her blue-green eyes. He squeezed her fingers reassuringly.
‘Every Deephomer submits to a letting,’ she said. ‘And they submit willingly, in supplication and with good grace.’
‘But why?’ said Micah.
‘Like I told you, Micah, letting is done for our own good. Father says it restores calm and bestows tranquillity on the restless spirit …’
‘By taking blood,’ said Micah, nonplussed.
‘By taking bad blood,’ said Cara. She smiled again, and pulled one of her hands from his and placed the back of it against his forehead. ‘Happen it might benefit a restless spirit like you.’
‘Me?’ Just the thought of it made Micah shudder. He eased away from her and straightened up. ‘I don’t know, Cara,’ he murmured.
‘You’ve been happy here in Deephome, haven’t you, Micah?’ Cara asked.
‘Well, yes,’ Micah admitted.
‘You’ve felt warm and safe and protected here?’ Cara’s voice was measured and low.
‘Yes,’ said Micah.
‘And what has passed between us, that has made you happy?’ Her hand reached out, and her fingers played idly with the cuff of his hacketon jacket.
Micah nodded.
‘Then you have to decide.’ Cara’s gaze met his, and Micah saw those turquoise eyes of hers sparking with emotion. ‘Whether you become a Deephomer,’ she said. ‘Whether you stay here as one of us. Whether you allow yourself to be protected by my father and …’
‘And?’ said Micah.
Cara rose to her feet and put her arms round his neck. ‘Loved by me,’ she whispered.
Thirty-Eight
Where was Eli?
Micah peered out through the entrance to Deephome, and let out a low groan. The stockade steps were deserted, and snow was falling thick and heavy out of a dark and brooding sky.
Micah pulled up the collar of his hacketon and stepped outside. Snowflakes hissed softly all round him. He climbed the wooden steps of the stockade gingerly and, gripping the tops of the sharpened staves of wood, looked up into the stippled air of the valley gorge. The snow landed on his head, his shoulders, the backs of his hands. Fullwinter’s grip seemed tighter than ever, and even the sentinels were only venturing as far as the lowest lookout point at the jutting rock. Micah groaned again.
He’d already checked everywhere he could think of. The great chamber, the meeting chamber, the eating chamber, the kitchens. He’d tried the sleeping galleries, but not only had Eli not been there, but his sleeping niche looked as though it hadn’t been occupied for some while. He’d returned to the hot pool, wondering whether the cragclimber had gone there to bathe. But he had not, and the half dozen Deephomers who were there, their heads sticking out of the hot steamy water, had no knowledge of his whereabouts. He’d even ventured into the narrow tunnel that led to the equipment store deep down inside the rock. But the tunnel had proved empty and there was something about the door, thick-cobwebbed by cave spiders, that gave him the creeps.
Now, Micah felt scratchy and bothered. He didn’t know what he thought of the letting, or of brother Kilian, or how to take what Cara had told him. He wasn’t sure of anything any more. That was why he wanted to talk it over with Eli, for the cragclimber was sure to have an opinion. He would wrinkle his weatherbeaten brow, run his fingers through his hair and fix him with those watery blue eyes of his, and mull over everything, his voice calm and measured.
Yes, Eli would know what to do. He always did.
Micah pulled the stout hacketon more tightly about him and was about to head back into the warmth of the store chamber when there was a commotion of screeches and squawks, and half a dozen pitchwyrmes – in their pearlwhite coats of winter – flapped noisily up into the air. The next moment a hunched snowy figure lurched into view.
‘Eli,’ Micah breathed, but as the man came closer, and Micah picked out the grey cloak and the red hat and the thick black beard, he saw that it was not the cragclimber at all, but rather Abel, the sentinel, back from his watch.
Abel tipped back the brim of his hat, sending snow falling to the ground, raised a hand to shield his eyes, then waved. Micah waved back, and when Abel reached the stockade and climbed the rope ladder, he helped him onto the stockade steps.
‘Thank you kindly … brother Micah, isn’t it?’ he said, snow falling from his beard as he spoke.
‘It’s Micah,’ he said. ‘Though strictly speaking, I ain’t no brother. Not yet.’
Abel cocked his head to one side, dislodging more of the snow that had settled on his hat, and looked Micah up and down. ‘So I see,’ he said. ‘You and brother Eli still fixing to leave us come the thaw?’
‘Maybe,’ said Micah. ‘I …’ He frowned. ‘Have you seen Eli?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Abel nodded. ‘He’s up by beak rock. Told me he found Deephome a mite too crowded for his liking, and wanted to be alone. I left him staring up at the top of the valley – though on a day like this, there’s precious little to see.’ He clapped a gloved hand on Micah’s shoulder. ‘Come, brother,’ he said. ‘No sense waiting out here in the cold. He’ll come back in when he’s good and ready. You hungry?’
Micah nodded. He had not eaten since he’d left Cara in the bathing chamber the previous night, and now his belly was grumbling.
Abel patted Micah’s back. ‘Then let’s go get us something to eat.’
They helped each other down the slippery steps. A tall man with salt-and-pepper stubble was standing at the bottom. Abel removed the horn from his shoulder and handed it across to him.
‘There y’are, Joel,’ he said. ‘And you take care now. That snow’s treacherous. I wouldn’t go no further than the beak rock if I was you.’
Joel thanked him for the warning and climbed the stairs. Abel headed over to the row of hooks along the inner wall of the stockade, and replaced his wet cloak for a dry one. Micah watched him. He imagined himself returning from an early watch, t
aking off a cold sodden cloak and slipping on a dry comforting one instead, before stepping back into the warmth and security of Deephome.
‘I just don’t understand it,’ Abel was saying, adjusting the ties at the collar of the cloak. ‘Why anybody would choose to go back out there into the weald when we’ve got all this right here.’
They paused in the entrance to the store chamber and stamped the snow from their boots. Ahead of them, other Deephomers were also on their way to the eating chamber, and Abel and Micah joined them, with Abel amiably returning the nods and smiles he was given.
‘I been here twelve years now, and there ain’t a day gone past when I haven’t thanked the Maker for delivering me to the Deephome.’ He gave Micah a playful nudge. ‘But then I was just a simple farmhand from the plains, not a tough young cragclimber like yourself.’
Micah shrugged nonchalantly, unbuttoning his hacketon jacket as he did so. ‘Thing is, Abel, there’s a whole weald out there to explore and I’m not sure I’m ready to settle down in one tiny corner of it just yet,’ he said, enjoying the measured drawl of his voice, and the the way it sounded like Eli’s.
Abel breathed in and Micah heard the sucked air whistling over his teeth. He shook his head slowly from side to side.
‘I had me three years at a gutting tarn, knee-deep in wyrme guts, before striking out on my own. I got me this in a scrimshaw den,’ he said, pulling up his sleeve to reveal an angry-looking scar that extended down his inner arm from elbow to wrist. ‘And I lost these in a liquor hole.’ His lips drew back in a clenched snarl that revealed three missing teeth. He snorted. ‘Guess I seen all the weald I want to see.’
They entered the eating chamber, that was filling up for the midday meal, and sat down at one of the long tables. Servers appeared beside them and set down dishes. Micah appraised the plate of crisped wyrmeribs and steaming rootbeets that had been placed before him.
‘When I stumbled into the deep gorge here, I was all but dead on my feet,’ Abel was saying. ‘Fullsummer it was. My water bottle had been empty three days and I was racked with a harsh thirst.’ He shook his head earnestly. ‘But the prophet took me in. Watered me, and fed me. Offered me shelter and protection. I felt like I’d finally found me a home.’