by Martin Ash
It was cold, but to his surprise it felt soft and doughy, almost flesh-like within its binding. As he clasped it in his hands he felt it move, a sudden, vigorous palpitation. A beat. He shuddered, almost letting it fall. The thing was alive! But the life was utterly cold. Its chill permeated the binding as if with intent. It penetrated his flesh, seeming to creep with horrible, inhuman intention into his veins.
Resisting the desire to unbind the cloth and look inside, Sildemund pushed the loathsome bundle into the satchel that was still slung over his shoulder.
There was a movement across the room, at the arch in the wall. Sildemund gasped as a figure appeared.
‘Meg!’
He started forward, startled, stunned, overjoyed, shocked at his sister’s appearance, for there was a bright, swollen bruise in the middle of her forehead, and she was ghastly pale, her eyes hollow with dark rings. She wore a familiar tunic and hose, though both were torn and stained. At her waist was a sabre and dagger.
‘Meg!’
Then he halted, suddenly wary and deeply afraid. He backed away.
Meglan had her arms open, ready to embrace him. ‘Sil. What’s wrong?’
He stared about him wildly, his eyes wide.
‘Sil! Sil! It’s me. It’s Meg.’ Now she started towards him, but he backed away further.
‘Stay back!’ His jaw trembled, his knees turning to rubber. He was suddenly without strength, defeated by this most cruel of tricks, and he cried out, ‘Do you think you can fool me again? First Jans, now my sister!’
His hands helplessly gripped the satchel at his hip.
A glimmer of understanding came into Meglan’s eyes. ‘You saw Jans? Where? Sil, it wasn’t him. You know that, don’t you?’
‘I have the Heart,’ said Sildemund weakly. ‘There’s no need to disguise yourself again.’
‘This is not a disguise, Sil. You’re my brother, my other half. Surely you know me?’
‘You can kill me,’ Sildemund said, quietly. His spirit had fled him. Suddenly he was overwhelmingly tired. The tears started to his eyes and poured down his cheeks. He had no wish to carry on. Sobbing, he said, ‘I’m unarmed. I can’t fight you.’
‘Sil, how can I convince you? I’ll tell you something. Remember, when we were children-‘
‘No!’ The idea that the intimacy of their shared childhood should be violated by this horror filled him with sudden fury. ‘You could know! You could know everything! You assume the flesh – do you take the memories, the personality too?’
As he yelled these words, the realization hit him and he staggered back as if from a blow. The Elders had said it: Sko-ulatun can assume the form of any whose heart he has devoured. Jans, then, was dead, the prey of this monster. And if the person, the apparition, standing before him now was not Meglan, then his sister Meglan too – sweet, beloved Meglan, with all her foibles, her temper, her spirit, her life – Meglan had suffered the same fate.
It was too much. An anguished cry escaped his lips and his knees buckled. At his hip he was dimly aware of an icy, forceful pulse. ‘There’s no need for this,’ he croaked, sinking back, his head tipping forward, too heavy to bear. ‘I can’t resist. I’ve come too far. Take the Heart. It’s yours.’
Meglan’s eyes brimmed with tears. ‘Sil. Sil… We’ve both come this far, by separate paths. Now we have to go on, together.’ She was unbuckling the belt at her waist, with its sabre and dagger. She let it fall to the floor, then kicked it so that it slid towards him. ‘Take the blades, Sil.’
‘I can’t fight you, even with them. You know it.’
‘You can’t fight Sko-ulatun, it’s true. But Meglan can be slain. Pick them up.’
He hesitated, then, with uncertainty, reached for them and slowly drew both weapons from their sheaths. Still on his knees he held them shakily towards her. She came forward, her arms open. ‘Sil, my brother. My love!’
And he knew he could only trust. His longing for her, his longing for truth amidst all this duplicity, this obfuscation and terror, overcame everything else.
He let out an anguished cry. The weapons fell from his hands and clattered to the stone floor. He knew he could stand no more. Racked with sobs he reached out, to accept whatever might come. He grasped her and took her in his arms, and her arms tightened around him. Her body was warm and supple, her scent familiar. He clasped her hard as she embraced him, and they wept, clinging to one another, kissing each other’s faces, afraid to let go.
~
When at last they drew back Sildemund became aware that others had entered the chamber. The three Elders – the crone, the woman and the girl-child – stood beneath the arch through which Meglan had entered. A number of fighters stood before them.
Sildemund stiffened.
His sister turned her head to follow his gaze, then smiled. ‘It’s all right, Sil.’
‘No, it isn’t!’ He aimed an accusing finger at the three. ‘You work with him! With Sko-ulatun! You kept him here, alive!’
The crone nodded. ‘It is true.’
‘You fed him living hearts!’
‘Ah, you have not understood,’ said the Elder. ‘Sko-ulatun does not live. He exists, but his is a travesty of life. It is a travesty even of death, a debasement of everything we know of the cycles of life and death and rebirth or the eternal return. In that state he can’t die, other than by particular means. Thus, to have deprived him of his ‘life’ would have been to gift him an exultation of suffering, at the end of which his bodily form would indeed have wasted to nothing. But his essence, his corrupted soul, would have been liberated. He would remain chained to the world and would have returned in some other guise. We couldn’t allow that. So we held him here, keeping him from his Heart, until we could destroy him utterly.’
Sildemund’s voice shook. ‘How many innocents did you sacrifice then, to satisfy his craving?’
‘Many hearts were given that he might endure, it’s true. It caused us tremendous remorse. But which way would you have it?’
‘Remorse?’ Sildemund was aghast. ‘Remorse? What are you? I understand what you say about Sko-ulatun, but to sacrifice so many others, who are innocent of any crime… to murder them in order to sustain him..? You are like him. You are no better.’
‘We are all his kin,’ the crone replied. ‘All of us, yourself included. Sko-ulatun is our First Father and he has corrupted us all. But Sildemund, you defame us, yet are you so innocent? Have others not died, without need, so that you might live on?’
‘You are crazy! I’ve killed no one!’
‘You’re a flesh-eater, so I understand.’
‘Of animals, yes.’
‘And you know no dilemma, no remorse?’
‘There’s no question-‘
‘We disagree! It’s our conviction that there is a question. Each time we fed Sko-ulatun, we suffered. We accept that we took life unnecessarily. It was wrong, we knew it. It was our dilemma. But it was for the greater good. There was no other way.’
Sildemund stared at her with mounting discomfort. ‘You- you are saying..?’
‘Goats, pigs, sheep. Those were the hearts we gave him.’
Sildemund was momentarily struck dumb. He struggled for a response, a means to reclaim his composure. Another thought followed, and he blurted out, ‘You killed Picadus!’
‘Your friend forced our guards to defend themselves. But they are rigorously and specifically trained. They can and will kill, be sure of that, but it is as a last resort. Their greatest skill is defence. Two died at your friend’s hands, but he is alive. He’s gravely injured and it will not be a swift recovery, but his injuries are not believed to be mortal.’
Sildemund fell back into silence. Unconsciously, one hand rested on his satchel, and he felt the sudden pulse of the thing inside. Meglan reassuringly squeezed his free hand in hers. A young female fighter came forward carrying a belt with sabre and dagger.
‘Now that we have established who you are – and what you are not – we g
ive you these,’ said the crone. ‘They won’t help you against Sko-ulatun, but you may take them if you wish.’
Who I am. What I’m not… It was something he had not considered. Just as he had been unsure of Meglan, she had been unsure of him. She had been testing him in the same way he tested her, neither knowing that the other was not Sko-ulatun.
He climbed shakily to his feet, and accepted the weapons. The fighter picked up those he had released and gave them back to Meglan. She said, ‘We should go now.’
Meglan nodded. Observing her, Sildemund said, ‘How did you get those bruises?’
‘These?’ She gestured to the marks on her body, and the torn clothing. ‘These I acquired when I travelled here with Sko-ulatun and his followers.’
Sildemund raised his eyebrows. ‘You were with him?’
She nodded. ‘And this one,’ she touched her forehead, ‘this one was given to me by Epta.’
‘Epta?’
Meglan indicated the young female fighter. ‘This is Epta.’
Sildemund frowned. ‘You’re Epta? The daughter of Kemorlin?’
The young woman nodded.
‘Your father is here,’ Sildemund said.
‘I know.’
Perplexed, he turned back to Meglan. ‘She gave you this injury? Why?’
The crone spoke. ‘We can’t linger here trading explanations. Sildemund, you encountered Sko-ulatun in the guise of another: Jans. Is that true?’
‘Yes. I escaped, but he’s here somewhere, in the corridors. And Gully – I’m concerned for Gully.’
‘Providing Gully keeps away from Sko-ulatun, he’ll be safe – at least for now. Sko-ulatun will come here, following the Heart, and Meglan, for whom he yearns. We’ve emptied the complex so no others will fall victim to him, and now we have to leave.’
‘To go where?’
‘Just follow.’ The crone turned and, with the others, passed through arch.
‘What about this?’ said Sildemund, patting his satchel.
She paused. ‘The Heart of Shadows. You must bring it.’
XXVIII
They made their way through more abandoned corridors, footsteps reverberating on cold stone flags, their fighters running on ahead to ensure their enemy was not lying in wait. Meglan cast long glances aside at her brother as they marched, taking joy in the sight of him. Just days had passed, but both had endured so much in that short time. It seemed an eon had passed since they had been together. She allowed herself a smile, though prominent in her mind was the knowledge that this was no time for celebration. She was deeply fearful of what they still had to face.
For his part, Sildemund wanted to know how Meglan had come to be in Garsh. She had been perhaps the last person he had expected to see, and he had still not fully taken in the fact that she was here with him. In breathless whispers she told him her story: how she had ridden with such urgency from Volm to find him and bring him back with the stone. She told of crossing the wasteland of Dazdun’s Despair, guided by the strange little talisman mystifyingly attached to her wrist. She told him about Skalatin’s relentless pursuit, and Jans’s awful death. Then she related how she had arrived at Dharsoul only to witness, unwittingly, Sildemund’s departure for Garsh.
At this point Sildemund interrupted, wanting more detail as he recalled the solitary female figure that had appeared on the hill beside the Dharsoul Road.
‘I thought it was you, Meg. Then I dismissed it, convinced it couldn’t have been.’
‘Most probably it was, then. So close, and neither of us knew it! And yet… I thought of you then.’
‘And I of you.’
‘We knew, but didn’t know that we knew.’
‘There was another figure,’ Sildemund said. ‘It appeared from behind a rock. I caught no more than a glimpse.’
‘From beneath a rock,’ corrected Meglan, recalling with distaste Skalatin’s sudden emergence. She recounted how he had waited for her outside Dharsoul, how she had challenged him; then his casual, despicable slaughter of the two peasants on the road. She told him of the raid on the Darch troops, her capture by Fagmar and his gang, the grotesque irony of her ‘rescue’ by Skalatin, who was Sko-ulatun, and how she had finally had no choice but to enter Garsh at his side.
‘I raised the alarm to expose his deceit. It was all I could do. In the confusion I ran. Epta and two others happened upon me.’ She touched her bruised forehead. ‘They struck me down, concerned that I was his follower, or even that I might be him. I was brought to the Elders just a short time before you arrived. I was conscious by then, and told them my tale.’
She looked at him again, but he said nothing more. There were other details she had learned, confided to her by the Revenant Elders. They had given her unique insight into the role both she and Sildemund still had to play. It filled her with terror. To face Sko-ulatun again… She tried to put it from her mind, for the Elders had made it plain that she had no choice in the matter.
There were descending a stone staircase which spiralled into the depths of Garsh. The walls changed from decorated stone to natural unadorned rock, suggesting that they had passed below the level of the streets and that this passage was hewn into the granite underbelly of the hill itself.
At Meglan’s prompting Sildemund recounted his own adventures. ‘I’m still under sentence of death, Meg,’ he said, telling her of the incident in which Queen Lermeone had identified the Heart of Shadows. ‘Whatever happens here, my life is forfeit. Gully and Pic, too.’
Meglan frowned. They continued their gloomy descent. Sildemund gave the remainder of his tale, and when he reached the end said, in a low whisper, ‘But I’m still suspicious. The Revenants left the Heart on the marble slab back there. Why? I or you might have been Sko-ulatun. They didn’t know. He could have appeared in any guise, and taken the Heart. All would have been lost.’
‘It’s not quite like that,’ Meglan replied in a low voice, but she kept her thoughts to herself again, still uncertain of the things she had been told. Her head ached from Epta’s blows. She was sore all over. Her back and chest were bruised from where the runaway Darch horses had rammed into her, and she bore other grazes, swellings and contusions from her struggles with Skalatin, Fagmar and the brigands who had tried to rape her. She was exhausted, wanting no more of this, longing to just lie down and sleep, then wake to find herself back at home with her father in Volm, that all this had been just a terrible dream.
‘Where are they taking us?’ demanded Sildemund.
They had arrived at the foot of the stairs. A short corridor extended before them, its ceiling low and arched. A larger, lighter area, a floor of richly coloured mosaic, opened beyond it.
As they entered this they saw that it was a circular chamber, wide and spacious, its ceiling a vast, spectacularly high dome formed of a multitude of interlaced stained glass panes. Through this structure, light in a thousand varying hues penetrated to illuminate the floor and walls in myriad brilliant shades. Such was the play of light and colour that the very air was tinted, so that to advance across the chamber was to pass through a veil of ever-changing tones.
On the far side of the chamber reared the effigy of a gigantic serpent, carved in white wood and figured with rare and precious gems. It was set into a tall arched recess so that the colours from above fell at its base in shifting rainbow patterns, but not upon its actual form. At the sight of this Meglan’s heart lurched and she stopped short. Her mouth went suddenly dry. The hairs on her skin rose as she scoured her mind, haunted by something just beyond conscious grasp. Her thoughts flew back to her journey along the mysterious Serpentine Path, and the little talisman she had carried all this way. She stared at the great serpent form, unable to tear her eyes away.
The old Revenant took her arm. ‘Come, Meglan.’
She led her on towards the centre of the circular chamber.
Sildemund gazed in awe at the fabulous dome overhead. Resplendent, almost incandescent, yet it looked so delicate in its multi-
hued translucency. An impossible construction, which seemed to his astonishment to be made entirely of stained glass – a relatively uncommon material. He could not work out how it was supported. Though he could see threadlike metallic struts running across its arch, they looked too frail to be capable of shoring such weight. By his calculations it defied natural law. He was filled with admiration for the unknown architect who had conceived and created it.
Huge figures returned his wide-eyed gaze, suspended on the variegated glass backdrop of leaves, fruits and refulgent, abstract shapes. The figures extended across almost the entire dome: an old woman beside a younger one, who held a babe to her breast, and beside her a girl-child. At their feet was coiled a great white serpent.
‘The three aspects of Claine, the universal Mother, the first Goddess,’ said the second Revenant Elder, the young woman, at his side. He had not heard her speak before. Her voice jolted him from his reverie. ‘The becoming of youth; the giving and nurturing of motherhood; the wisdom of age.’
‘And the serpent?’ enquire Sildemund with some unease.
‘A symbol more ancient than you can imagine. It represents oracular wisdom, revelation and prophetic counsel. In various forms it existed all across the world as it was before everything was changed. But to uncover its true meaning you must search hard. You must look beneath the ruins of all temples and shrines to find the ruins of the original shrines built to Claine. Look behind your most ancient writings to find texts more ancient still. And the search will not be easy, for most were destroyed utterly, purposefully. But that is where you will find the truth of our origins, though your laws will condemn you to death for even looking. Sko-ulatun and his followers took the serpent, as they took all of the First Mother’s symbols, and corrupted it, destroyed it, hid all traces of its original nature. The serpent now is seen as a vile, poisonous and deceitful thing that crawls upon its belly. It is shunned and feared by men and women alike. Sko-ulatun took everything, in his jealousy and his rage, for he could not permit that the Goddess gave life and he did not. He even hid her name and established that her daughters would forever walk in their fathers’ shadows, and their offspring would forever bear their fathers’ names. He was the First Father, and in his vanity believed himself god over all. The society in which you live is testament to this, is it not?’