by Jen Williams
It was like being thrown into a nest of spitting snakes. The flying lizards were in an instant frenzy, snapping and lunging at them, and it was all Frith could do to swing the dagger back and forth. Keenly he longed for the Edenier; how easy it would be to throw these creatures back, to burn them or blast them with ice until all were dead.
One creature leapt forward and slammed its bony head into Wydrin’s midriff. She flew backwards, crashing to the deck. She sagged there briefly, the short sword loose in her hand. Frith turned and sank the dagger into the monster’s leathery hide and felt a searing moment of satisfaction as it screeched with pain, and then it flicked its enormous wing at him and he was flung to the deck himself. There was an ominous creaking from below him, and he had a moment to wonder exactly how awful it would be to fall through into the dark, no doubt to be torn apart by an entire host of winged monsters.
A strong hand on his shoulder pulled him to his feet.
‘Keep moving, princeling.’ Wydrin’s face was ashen, her right arm wearing a sleeve of blood. ‘I say we get to the side and jump over, swim for it. If we get to the beach, we can—’
There was a resounding crash and the entire ship trembled. Wydrin and Frith clung to each other as the flying creatures all took to the air at once, like starlings startled from a tree.
‘What now?’
Another monster was crawling its way over the shattered edge of the wreck: a giant, glorious lizard of cream and gold scales, its eyes like beautiful amber lamps. Frith immediately thought of Y’Ruen – only that old god matched this creature’s glorious lethality. It was a dragon, and on its back was a wild man with black hair and beard, a sword held in one hand, and a look of triumph in his eyes.
Before either of them had time to react, the dragon surged across the guardrail and landed amidst the flying creatures, its jaws closing around the neck of the nearest one with a sickening crunch. The monster, instantly dead, was dropped back through the hole in the deck and then the dragon leapt, bringing down those that were trying to flee. The man riding it swung his sword and cleaved a chunk of flesh from the flank of the nearest monster, and it, too, crashed to the deck. In seconds, the flying monsters that had so menaced them were lying in pieces on the remains of the deck, their thick scarlet blood soaking into the red planks. Those that had escaped were already small shapes against the sky, fleeing for some other part of the island.
For a few moments, there was silence. The great golden dragon stood with its snout in the air, snorting like a dog tracing a scent. The man on his back was cleaning his sword with a rag, before sliding it reverentially back into its scabbard. Something about that movement, the sheer practised care of it, tickled at the back of Frith’s mind, but he caught a small gasp of pain from Wydrin and the thought was lost.
‘Are you all right?’
She nodded at him ruefully. ‘Bastard thing bit right through my leathers. I’ll have a scar, I expect, but without my armour I wouldn’t have had a bloody arm.’
He pushed her hair back from her face and kissed her firmly. His heart was still beating too fast. Briefly she pulled her fingers through his hair and pressed herself to him. It was all right. She was alive. They were both alive.
‘Wydrin?’
They both turned at the sound of that voice. The man with the wild hair and beard had dismounted from the dragon, and was approaching them warily. He held out one hand, as though to stave off a blow. Belatedly, Frith recognised the clear brow, the kind blue eyes. He felt a rush of something in his chest, quite unlike the Edenier, and to his surprise he found himself grinning. Next to him he felt Wydrin take a startled breath, and then let it out. He squeezed her arm, wanting her to know he was there for her.
‘Sebastian!’ she cried. ‘You absolute fucking shithead!’
35
Wydrin had hit him, and then hugged him, and then hit him again.
Sebastian’s sudden reappearance had seemed more extraordinary to her than the dragon who had turned back into a man, but now that they were all safely off the wreck and camped on the narrow beach, he could see her eyes returning to Oster again and again. There would be a time of questions now, although Sebastian couldn’t imagine how they could possibly answer them all. Euriale was truly an island of mysteries.
‘So that is the Spinner?’
The enormous spider-like creature was crouching off to one side, its legs held protectively around it. They had managed to coax it away from the ship and onto the sand, but it hadn’t spoken a word since, and now it was quivering slightly and humming under its breath.
‘He is healing himself,’ said Oster in way of an answer. They had built a small fire as the daylight bled from the sky, and they sat around it now, bedraggled and blood-stained.
‘And who are you again?’ asked Wydrin pointedly. Sebastian had scavenged some berries and root vegetables, and they had shared them out around the fire. Between her words, Wydrin chewed on the end of something that was almost a turnip. She didn’t look too happy about it. Frith had torn off a piece of his shirt and they had used it as a makeshift bandage for her arm. ‘Because I don’t think I have that clear in my head yet.’
Oster glared at her. ‘I am Oster. That is all you need to know.’
Wydrin gestured wildly with the root vegetable. ‘That’s all you have to say? You don’t think the turning into a dragon bit requires more explanation?’
Oster shifted where he sat. ‘It is the Spinner’s job to give explanations. He was to explain everything to me. It is not my place to answer questions, and certainly not yours to ask them of me.’
‘I was to sing him his history,’ murmured the Spinner. His voice was high and faraway, as though he spoke to someone in a dream. ‘His history, his new, shining life. Each of them were to have been new and perfect, but the Eye is in flux, in flux.’
‘Spinner?’ asked Wydrin. ‘Are you with us again?’ But there was no answer.
‘Obviously, something went wrong on the Poison Chalice,’ said Sebastian. ‘Why are you even on the island?’
‘I could ask you the same thing!’ said Wydrin, raising an eyebrow, but then she shook her head. ‘It was a bloody mess. We were boarded, and I was kidnapped by this insane god-freak called Estenn, the same one who took the Spinner here prisoner. She has some ludicrous plan to go back to the time of the Citadel and stop the mages before they imprisoned the gods. She wants to bring them all back.’
‘What?’ Sebastian paused with a handful of berries halfway to his mouth. ‘Why, by the love of Isu, would anyone want to do that?’
‘She is a fanatic,’ put in Frith. The young lord looked bedraggled and dirty, but his eyes blazed beneath the mop of white hair. ‘Her followers call her the Emissary, and she believes it is her purpose to restore the elder gods to Ede.’
‘After we went to all the trouble of getting rid of the last two, accidental and otherwise,’ put in Wydrin.
‘And what’s more, apparently it is possible. This Eye of Euriale that the Spinner tends can act as a portal back to the past. My staff was created when the Citadel was built – it is her key to travelling back there, and now she has it.’ Frith leaned back, the fire casting his face into angular shadows. ‘She wants to create a world where the gods were never banished, where they lived to bring the war between them and the mages to a bloody conclusion. Ede as we know it could be destroyed.’
Sebastian shook his head slowly. There was an anxious twisting in his gut, and he could feel it reflected in Oster. The silver thread that connected them vibrated with it. He could feel anger there too.
‘So, we have to get to this Eye thing,’ said Wydrin. She paused to chew a particularly tough piece of tuber, her face screwed up with mild distaste. ‘Before Estenn does. Legs here knows where it is,’ she gestured over her shoulder at the Spinner. ‘He was carrying us there before that wreck turned out to be full of monsters.’
‘Is there anything we can do to heal him faster?’ Frith addressed Oster. ‘For all we know,
Estenn is already there.’
Oster shook his head, looking affronted. ‘How should I know that? It was the Spinner’s duty to counsel me, and thanks to the actions of these zealots he is now incapable of this. It is I who have been misused and betrayed here. I may not know my histories, but I know that I was not birthed in the Eye to provide you with answers to your inane questions. I have no interest in being useful to you.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ Wydrin stood up, chucking the last nubbin of tuber onto the fire. ‘You’re a dragon, and you’re on our side for once. I would call that pretty useful, whether you like it or not. Sebastian, would you take a brief walk with me?’
Wydrin watched her friend out of the corner of her eye as they walked a short distance down the beach, leaving the orange glow of the fire behind. His long black hair was tangled and wild, matted in places with dirt, and his beard was the bushiest she’d ever seen it. His clothes were ragged and filthy, and he’d lost some weight, but his eyes were bright, his face animated. He simultaneously looked better and worse than when she’d last seen him.
‘So what did you think you were bloody playing at?’
Sebastian sighed, and turned to look at her. ‘I’m not sure I can really give you the answer to that, Wyd. I just had to get away. From the death, the fighting, the wilful courting of disaster. I wanted peace, and it felt like we were sailing back into danger again.’
Wydrin cleared her throat. ‘Well, you’ve done a great job of avoiding all that.’
Reluctantly, Sebastian smiled, and then shook his head. ‘Perhaps I am cursed. After all I have done, I wouldn’t be surprised.’
Wydrin made a disgusted noise. ‘You left us, in the middle of the night. No goodbye, no note. At least when you abandoned me last time you had the good grace to scribble on a piece of parchment for me. I thought … I thought you were probably dead, Seb.’
‘I could not talk to you about it. I didn’t know how to talk about it, so I thought it best if I—’
‘You are my sworn brother!’ She stopped, and took hold of his arm. They stood together in the dark, the bloated moon hanging above. She didn’t know if she wanted to strike him or embrace him again. ‘We are partners. You abandoned me!’
‘Wydrin, you do not need me any more. You have Frith now, and I know that you are happy. I would not lessen that, for anything in the world.’
Wydrin threw her hands up. ‘I love you, Sebastian, but you don’t half talk some horse shit sometimes. Who says that I need you? Who says that I need Frith? We are better together, all three of us – that’s the truth. If the last few years have taught me anything, it’s that. And are you trying to tell me that because I have taken a lover there is no room for anyone else in my life?’
To her surprise, Sebastian laughed. It was genuine, and it eased her heart a little.
‘I know better than to tell you anything.’ He shrugged. ‘I see the bond there is between the two of you, and I know that Frith would tear the world apart to protect you. Probably quite literally. And that you would skin anyone alive who dared give him so much as a funny look.’
A low wind blew up, chasing the sand between their boots. Wydrin sighed, and punched Sebastian lightly on the arm. ‘Just stop running off on us. It’s the Black Feather Three, and don’t you forget it.’
They stood in silence for a time, listening to the calls and shrieks of the animals hidden in the trees. The wild scent of the jungle was mixed with salt here, and the acrid scent of the sand. Wydrin thought of their walk up the Sea-Glass Road – it had been so hot, the air full of spice and the filth of the city. It felt like a hundred years ago.
‘You realise your new friend is some sort of god?’ she said idly, watching the expression of surprise that moved across Sebastian’s face. ‘A very handsome one, too. Much preferable to old O’rin beak-face.’
‘What are you talking about?’
Wydrin turned to face him. ‘Both Estenn and the Spinner described this place as the cradle of Ede, Sebastian. The old gods are dead, and there are new ones being born. It is the Spinner’s job to bring them forth. What is Oster, if he is not a god?’
Sebastian looked back to their fire, his eyes wide. Oster and Frith were sitting in silence there, the dark bulk of the Spinner squatting behind them like a lost shadow.
‘That can’t be, can it? I mean, he …’
‘Seems so normal? Apart from when he turns into a shimmering golden dragon, you mean?’ Taking pity on him, Wydrin threaded her arm through Sebastian’s and turned him to walk back to their small camp. ‘Trust you to have a crush on a god, Sebastian.’
36
The treasure had been tainted. Devinia was almost sure of it.
She had watched the Banshee’s men and women handling the sacks, piling gold into the waiting casks they had brought with them, and had noticed how their hands had been tinged with the red dust afterwards. She had thought little of it at the time, and then, days later as they sailed up the waterway with the Dawning Man following on behind, it had seemed like every crew member she saw was covering his or her mouth to cough, or was rubbing at his or her chest, an expression of faint discomfort on their faces. The hatchet-faced woman who had brought them their last two meals had what looked like a bright red sore at the corner of her mouth – Devinia saw Augusta glaring at it with professional interest – and she had staggered as she’d walked away, even though the waters were calm.
And then there was Kellan.
On the fourth day, Augusta and Devinia had been summoned to the captain’s cabin on board the Dragon’s Maw. The place was a mess; dirty clothes were slung in the corners, plates covered in the crusted remnants of food littered the table, sticky goblets were everywhere. Ristanov stood by the single window, her arms crossed over her chest, while Kellan was slumped in the chair. It was gloomy in the cabin, and his face was cast into shadow.
‘You were a medic, yes?’
Augusta frowned at the question. ‘I’m the Poison Chalice’s sawbones, if that’s what you’re asking.’
‘You are our medic now, crone,’ snapped the Banshee.
‘What happened to yours?’ asked Devinia. ‘Even you can’t have been stupid enough to sail up here without someone to patch up your wounds.’
‘He died,’ said the Banshee. ‘One of the very few of my crew to die when we took your ship.’ She sniffed. ‘Old one, you will look at Kellan. He is ailing for something. You will cure him.’
Augusta barked laughter. ‘Paw at that scumbag’s carcase? Why, you can go fuck yourself, girl.’
Banshee nodded to the guard behind them, and Devinia felt the cold press of steel to her throat.
‘Refuse, and I will bless my cabin with the blood of Devinia the Red,’ said Ristanov shortly. ‘My patience is a small thing today. Do you understand this, crone?’
Augusta sighed dramatically. ‘Fine. Cut my arms free then, unless you want me to examine the wretch with my eyes alone.’
Her bonds cut, Augusta took a moment to rub vigorously at her wrists, before approaching the man slumped in the chair.
‘What seems to be the trouble?’
Kellan lifted his head, and Devinia caught the dull gold sheen of the crown. She had yet to see him take it off. ‘I have a fever, is all,’ he said, his voice thick. ‘It’s the air on this island, bound to make anyone ill.’
Augusta bent over him, tutting under her breath. Devinia watched as she pressed her hands to Kellan’s face.
‘Any chance of a bit more light? It’s darker than a devil’s arsehole in here.’
With every sign of reluctance, the Banshee lit a pair of oil lamps, filling the room with a dirty yellow light. Augusta stepped back, her shoulders stiff. ‘That ain’t no fever, lad, or have you not looked in the mirror lately?’
Stepping away from her guard, Devinia peered over the old medic’s shoulder. Kellan was pale, with dark circles under his eyes, and where the gold touched his skin there was a creeping red growth. It was fibrous, furry al
most, and Devinia was reminded of the strange red dust in the chamber.
‘What is it?’ asked the Banshee.
‘How should I bloody know?’ Catching the angry look the Banshee threw her, Augusta softened her voice. ‘Looks like a skin disease to me, but I haven’t seen anything like it before. He’s burning up, but his sweat is cold. His heart is beating like he’s been doing circuits of the deck.’ She bent over slightly, looking Kellan straight in the eye. ‘You need to take that crown off, son. Even if it isn’t causing what you’ve got, you need to get some air to the infected area.’
‘I cannot take it off,’ mumbled Kellan. ‘The Dawning Man listens to my every thought now. It obeys me. I live through it.’
‘You should stop,’ said Devinia. ‘Put down anchor for a while, wait for this to pass.’
‘And wait here for the island to destroy us?’ The Banshee shook her head. ‘There is still much to see here, yes. And the Dawning Man is now our bodyguard.’
‘It’s old magic, you fool, and you don’t know what you’re playing with.’ Devinia looked back at the red growths on Kellan’s forehead. She felt ill just looking at them. ‘My daughter encountered magic like this, and it led to the deaths of hundreds—’
‘No one is interested in your bitch daughter!’
Devinia looked up in surprise – the Banshee sounded truly unhinged. Next to them, Augusta reached out to pluck the crown from Kellan’s head, and he surged to his feet.
‘You will not take it from me!’ he bellowed. ‘I hold the power here!’
There was an answering flurry of shouts from outside, followed by a piercing scream. The Banshee ran from the room, pounding up the stairs, followed by her guard. Devinia and Augusta shared a look, before following them out onto the deck.
The Dawning Man stood in front of the Dragon’s Maw, shining like a beacon in the sun. In its great golden fist was a man, apparently plucked straight off the deck. He was screaming, his legs kicking helplessly against the solid crystal fingers holding him in place. From one of the ships someone fired a volley of arrows that clattered harmlessly against the creature.
