‘What’s left to us, if we can’t go back, or follow the rivers to the coast?’ asked Pazel.
Before Thaulinin could answer, something splashed in the stream. It was Bolutu, dressed in some kind of swimming trousers. He climbed up onto the bank, laughing at their surprise; evidently he had covered some distance underwater. Bolutu had been swimming every day in Uláramyth, and had already shared many a story of rainbow-hued fish, flooded ruins, green river dolphins that nipped his toes. But this time he told no tales.
‘Mr Undrabust, why are you not at the house? The doctors are waiting. I have been seeking you high and low.’
‘You are such a donkey,’ said Thasha, socking Neeps in the arm.
‘Ouch! Not fair! I didn’t forget; they had at me first thing this morning. They never do it twice in one day.’
All the same he leaped up and ran for the communal house. Bolutu watched him go, then turned and looked at Ramachni. His look of elation was gone. ‘Have you told them?’ he asked.
His words struck Pazel cold. ‘What’s happened now?’ he asked.
‘I do have good things to tell you, on occasion, Pazel,’ said the mage. ‘This is one such occasion. There is new hope for your friend.’
Joy welled up in Pazel’s chest. Thasha’s eyes lit with happiness, and even Hercól’s face brightened. But Ramachni quickly raised his paw. ‘I did not say that we had found a cure, for there is no cure for the mind-plague, until the Nilstone is cast out of Alifros. But Neeps has suffered no real damage yet, and we have devised a plan that could – if all goes well – delay the advance of the plague by several years. By that time our struggle with the Nilstone will have ended one way or another.’
‘What plan?’ said Thasha. ‘Tell us, for Rin’s sake!’
‘And say how we may help,’ added Ensyl.
‘The latter is easier by far,’ said Bolutu. ‘You may help by not minding any strange behaviour on Undrabust’s part, and never letting on that he is being … treated at all.’
He turned and looked away upstream. And Pazel saw that another figure was swimming towards them, dark and swift. With a splash the figure broke the surface: it was Lunja. She stood with the water about her calves, her soldier’s arms crossed before her and her silver eyes bright and wary.
‘Well?’ she said.
‘The elders have spoken,’ said Ramachni. ‘If you are willing it may begin tonight.’
‘I’ve told you already that I am willing, if there is truly no other way,’ said Lunja, ‘but I do not do this gladly. The notion repels me. I wish that you could promise success.’
‘No one can, woman of Masalym,’ said a voice from their right.
It was Lord Arim, standing by the tunnel’s mouth. He walked slowly into the yard, and behind him came Valgrif the wolf.
‘From the first ragged militias in their stand against the Chaldryl Argosies, Bali Adro soldiers have been courageous,’ he said. ‘Now you must show courage of a different sort, if you are to help your friend.’
‘Friend?’ said Lunja. ‘Is that what he is?’
She stepped out of the stream. To Pazel’s great surprise it was to him that she came – haltingly, looking him up and down. Only when she stood right before him, lovely and alien and severe, did Pazel realise the extent of her unease. Her face was rigid. Forcing herself, she reached out and placed a wet, webbed hand upon his cheek. She held it there, silently, studying his face. Just when Pazel was about to demand that someone explain, Lunja turned and marched swiftly past Lord Arim and into the tunnel. There she paused, and spoke without turning back.
‘Forgive my selfishness. He is my comrade too, and I will do what I can to save him. Only do not force me to speak of this idly. I will tell you when it is done.’
She vanished, a shadow among shadows. Pazel and Thasha looked at the others, amazed. ‘What in the bubbling Pits was that all about?’ said Thasha. ‘What does she have to do with Neeps’ cure?’
‘As Sergeant Lunja is one of just two dlömu in Uláramyth, she has everything to do with it,’ said Thaulinin. ‘But you will see soon enough. Come, my lord Arim: would you sit with us?’
‘There is no time,’ said the old selk. ‘We make the crossing tonight.’
Ramachni nodded, but Thaulinin looked gravely concerned. ‘Tonight!’ he said. ‘My lord, I fear the youths are not ready.’
Arim came slowly forward, gazing at Pazel and Thasha in turn. ‘Pazel Pathkendle is stronger than you know, and Lady Thasha will not benefit from delay. In any case it must be tonight.’ He raised a trembling hand and pointed. Nearly invisible (for there was light yet in the evening sky), the little Southern moon gleamed over the mountains. ‘The Candle passes through the horns of its mother-moon, and will not do so again for ten years. I must prepare, and you should rest while you can. After your meal we will find you.’
That evening the youths had little appetite, but others in their party were eager to talk. Myett had spent two days on the far fringes of Uláramyth, riding Valgrif’s broad shoulders. Big Skip, traces of sawdust in his beard, described the skills he was learning from his artisan friends. Neda and Cayer Vispek were in foul spirits, however, and ate apart. Lunja and Neeps did not come to dinner at all.
When Pazel, Thasha and Hercól stepped outside, the night was distinctly cold. Above was a sky full of brilliant stars, and a sliver of the yellow moon. A selk in dark robes was waiting for them beside a carriage. The two horses were black and solid as rhinos, but their eyes were the shining blue of the selk.
They set off. The roads of Uláramyth were empty, and for three dark miles no one spoke. Pazel was afraid for Thasha: the distance was back in her eyes. He glanced at her now, gazing from the carriage window, breath puffing white as smoke through her lips. A haunted face. He thought suddenly of the girl who had climbed atop another carriage, in the bedlam of the Etherhorde waterfront, to gape at him with a child’s mischief. The admiral’s daughter. He had never expected to so much as speak to her.
The driver spoke softly to the horses. The carriage stopped, and the three humans climbed out upon the barren shores of Osir Delhin, the Lake of Death.
It was a chilling place. The wind moaned like a voice from a melancholy dream. Both moons had cleared the horizon, and by their light Pazel saw driftwood and black stones, and small waves lapping the shore. The island too was dark. What are we doing here? he thought.
‘We have to wait here,’ said Thasha.
‘Yes,’ said the driver, climbing down from the carriage. ‘A boat will come for you. If you like you may wait in the carriage, out of the wind.’
Thasha began to walk towards the water. ‘Beware!’ called the driver. ‘The lake has a curious property: it cannot be swum. If you try, you will sink to the bottom as though wrapped in chains.’
Thasha kept moving, and Hercól and Pazel rushed after her. Pazel had a growing sense that the night held something terrible for Thasha. She had been distant so many times, but this would be something else, something altogether more drastic. There was no telling what she might do – or what might be done to her.
A few yards from the water they seized her arms. ‘Far enough,’ said Hercól gently. To Pazel’s immense relief she made no objection, but merely folded her legs and sat. Pazel and Hercól did the same on either side of her. Thasha laid her head on Hercól’s shoulder, and put her arms around her chest. She did not glance at Pazel at all.
‘I could do it,’ she said. ‘I could walk right into that lake.’
‘I doubt that you are immune, Thasha,’ said Hercól. ‘There is magic here as old as Alifros itself.’
Thasha closed her eyes and smiled. ‘Of course I’m not immune. I’d drown like anyone. Otherwise, what would be the point?’
‘Don’t talk that way!’ hissed Pazel. But Thasha just clung tighter to Hercól. ‘The boat is coming,’ she said. ‘You have to stay here.’
She hadn’t looked, but it was true: a small, lightless craft was approaching from the island. Pazel
could see neither oars nor sail. Strangest of all, the boat appeared to be empty. But as it drew nearer he saw that that was not quite true. Ramachni stood upon the bow, like a dark figurehead. When at last the boat struck ground he flicked his tail.
‘Come,’ he said.
They were on their feet now. Hercól took Thasha’s hands in his own. ‘Be strong, Thasha Isiq,’ he said. ‘I will be here when you return.’
She raised her head and kissed him briefly on the lips. ‘Someone will return,’ she said.
Pazel watched her climb into the boat. He raised a hand as if to touch her, then let it fall to his side. He couldn’t speak, couldn’t choose among the thousands of words he needed to say. ‘Thasha, wait!’ he managed to croak at last.
Only then did she look at him. In her face he saw alarm for the first time, indeed shock, to find him still ashore.
‘We are waiting, lad,’ said Ramachni. ‘Get in, and be quick.’
Speechless, Pazel scrambled into the boat. Thasha had been telling Hercól goodbye, but not him. Not yet. ‘What a fool I’ve fallen in love with,’ she said, touching his arm. Her voice ethereal, a distant echo of the one he knew.
The crossing was swift and frigid. Ramachni stood at the bow as before, and Pazel wondered if the force that moved them was his doing or some magic of the selk. Thasha’s mind cleared briefly: she looked at Pazel and told him plainly that Erithusmé’s memories were trickling into her mind.
‘A drop here, a drop there. Like a leaky tap.’ Thasha tried to smile.
‘What does that mean? Is she waking up?’
Thasha considered the question, then shook her head. ‘I don’t think she’s ever been asleep.’
The island drew near. It was stark and forbidding, and larger than Pazel had supposed. Ancient trees, vast of girth but bent low to the ground and twisted into writhing dragon-shapes, stood scattered over the dry earth, their roots clawing among paving stones and broken columns and the remains of tumbled walls. The wind was tearing the first leaves of autumn from their boughs, hurling them like playing cards into the night.
The boat ground ashore. Ramachni leaped out, and the youths followed, and soon they were marching up a dusty trail onto higher ground. They had not gone far when Thaulinin appeared, running sure-footed and soundless.
‘You’re here!’ he said. ‘Very good, it is time.’ He took a wine skin from his shoulder and filled a cup. ‘Have a sip to warm you – and then follow quickly. We dare not arrive too late.’
Pazel drank when his turn came, and felt the night’s chill retreating to his fingertips. Thaulinin led them on, over hills, up staircases of shattered stone, among the shells of ancient halls and towers. The trees cast twin shadows in the double moonlight. A great number of them, he saw now, were dead.
‘Why is this place so miserable?’ Pazel asked Thaulinin. ‘When did your people abandon it?’
‘You ask questions that would take all night to answer,’ said Thaulinin. ‘The selk never dwelt here, and the fall of those who did was a great tragedy, which some name as the moment this world lost her innocence. They were defeated in a war before the Dawn War, and Uláramyth became the seat of a demonic power. Wauldryl, it was called: the Place of Despair. If ever a land was hated, it was this one that we love. Its king dwelt on this island, in a secret chamber no one shall ever see again. Over the ages we have healed most of Uláramyth, but our successes here have been smaller, for the damage was profound.’
He glanced quickly at Pazel. ‘If Dastu had come here, all Uláramyth might have looked this way to him. Few persons have ever come to our realm against their will, but those who do find themselves in another place altogether – a deathly land, poisoned by the fumes of the volcano, where all that lives becomes rapacious and foul. It is always thus. We never spoke of Uláramyth in Dastu’s hearing, but his heart must have sensed what he would find here, and turned from it. May it find peace somewhere in Alifros, or beyond.’
They were nearing the top of the longest staircase yet, winding up the side of a barren hill. Pazel wished Thaulinin would go on speaking, if only to distract him from the mournful wind. The stars were sharp as cut-crystal, and for a moment Pazel imagined that he saw them through as the selk did: mute witnesses, looking down in judgement or pity. We are all young beneath the watchful stars. Would he ever understand just what that meant to the selk?
On the hilltop they stepped into the full blast of the wind. There was a railed platform here; it was the highest point on the island. And looking down at the back of the hill, which had been hidden until this moment, Pazel saw an extraordinary thing.
He took it at first for a walled pond or water tank. It was fifty or sixty feet square, and surrounded by a number of the ancient trees. Black and lustrous, it reflected the moons and the stars with an uncanny brilliance, like a mirror polished to perfection. But a moment later Pazel saw that it was not liquid he was gazing at, but stone.
The trail descended from the hilltop to the edge of this strange black courtyard. Beside the latter stood Lord Arim, alone and still, his bright blue eyes gazing up at them.
‘Go to him quickly,’ said Thaulinin. ‘I must remain here and keep watch. Farewell, Thasha Isiq!’
Thasha and Ramachni started down without a word. Pazel glanced at Thaulinin – why had he wished Thasha alone farewell? – but the selk only beckoned him on.
Arim did not move as they approached, but when they reached him the old selk turned and waved a hand over the square. ‘The Demon’s Court,’ he said. ‘Nothing older will you ever behold in Alifros. You are the first humans to stand here in many centuries, and you may well be the last. It was brought to this island in the dark times, for a dark purpose. But it is not evil in itself – not exactly.’
‘Remove your shoes,’ said Ramachni. ‘You must walk unshod upon the stone.’
Lord Arim’s feet were already bare. The old selk pointed up at the sky, and Pazel saw that the Polar Candle now stood precisely between the horns of the thin yellow moon.
‘Follow me when you are ready,’ said Lord Arim. With that he stepped up onto the stone, onto his own perfect reflection. Slowly he walked away from them. Pazel stared, transfixed. He was quite certain the stone was dry, and yet with each footfall its black surface rippled slightly, as though Lord Arim were walking on the surface of a pool.
Ramachni nudged Pazel’s ankle. ‘Crouch down, both of you. I want to see your faces.’
They obeyed, and Pazel saw stars reflected in Ramachni’s great black eyes. ‘Do you know why you are here?’ asked the mage.
‘Of course,’ said Thasha. ‘To bring Erithusmé back. So that she can fight for us. So that she can help us take the Nilstone out of Alifros, and defeat the Swarm. But before that can happen you need to get me out of the way.’
‘That is about half right,’ said Ramachni. ‘We need her aid, and desperately, for without it we are hopelessly unmatched. And though many count me wise, since the death of Arunis I have not felt so, for I cannot explain what prevents Erithusmé’s return. But with any luck that will change tonight.’
‘Gods damn it all!’ said Pazel, startling them both. He gripped Thasha’s arm. ‘What about her? You say they share a soul, but I can’t believe that. Thasha is Thasha. She’s seventeen. You can’t flood her with ten centuries of memory—’
‘Twelve,’ said Ramachni.
‘—and expect anything of her to be left intact. That’s like—’ he shook his hands desperately ‘—like pouring a cup of wine into a lake, and saying, “Don’t worry, the wine’s still there.” Well it’s not there, it’s ruined.’
‘Calm yourself,’ said Ramachni. ‘That is not how things stand.’
‘You’re a mage,’ said Pazel. ‘Seventeen years is nothing to you. But to Thasha it’s everything. If you do this, her life will be drowned, do you hear? It will be just some little moment that Erithusmé recalls now and then. Like a fever, a time when she was not herself. You might as well kill her.’
�
�Right,’ said Thasha. ‘Kill me.’
‘Over my dead body!’
‘Pazel Pathkendle!’ said Ramachni, his fur bristling. ‘I will tell you this but once. You love Thasha. You are hardly alone in that distinction. There is great danger to her in what we do tonight, and that cannot be avoided. She may even die – or you may, or I myself. But she was never singled out for sacrifice. This is not Treaty Day on Simja, boy, and I am no Sandor Ott.’
‘Ramachni,’ said Thasha, ‘where did Lord Arim go?’
Pazel started. The old selk had simply disappeared.
‘No more talk,’ said Ramachni. ‘Follow, unless you would undo all that we have worked to achieve.’ He stepped onto the stone of the courtyard, then looked back over his shoulder, waiting. Thasha groped for Pazel’s hand. Together they stepped onto the stone.
Pitfire!
The sensation was like a plunge into frigid water. And yet the shock was far deeper than that: he felt it in his muscle, his blood, his very bones. It was a moment of total annihilation, of not existing. But he was still here, still holding Thasha’s hand. Both of them were gasping, and their breath sounded oddly loud. Then he knew why: the wind had vanished, utterly. It was as if someone had just sealed a hatch.
‘What’s happening, Ramachni?’ Thasha whispered.
‘Look there,’ said the mage, pointing with his eyes. Pazel turned and saw nothing at first. Then his eyes made out a brown autumn leaf just beyond the edge of the courtyard, one of countless leaves tumbled by the wind. It was five feet off the ground – and perfectly motionless, as though trapped in a pillar of glass.
‘We have stepped outside of time,’ said Ramachni. ‘Once every ten years, when the moons conspire, anyone who enters the Demon’s Court may escape time’s dominion, for an hour or an age. When we depart, not a minute will have passed in the world outside. The old king of Wauldryl raised demons here, gaining servants overnight that would otherwise have needed centuries to mature. And there were other uses: prisoners who resisted interrogation saw their loved ones brought here, and made elderly in a heartbeat. Royal children were brought instantly to marriageable age. But the selk have turned even this place to the good.’
The Night of the Swarm (Chathrand Voyage 4) Page 31