Talsy cursed him and walked on. The heavy bag dug into her shoulder and her legs ached. She tried to remember whether she had been walking towards the setting sun when she had been on the thoroughfare. Then it had been closer to noon, however, and harder to tell which way was west. Vainly she searched for an alley that led west, hoping it would take her to the river, but each one she turned into curved away from the sun. The narrow streets were deserted now. Even the beggars had vanished into their shelters for the night. Gathering gloom filled the city as the sun sank. No lights shone from the shanties, and only a few street lamps illuminated the grimy roads.
Just as she wondered if she should find a hole to crawl into for the night, a rattle behind her made her jump and swing around. Four burly men approached her, their dirty, unshaven faces twisted in knowing leers as they fingered sticks and rusty knives. One had a longbow slung across his back, and his bright, mocking eyes raked her above a gap-toothed grin.
"Well, well, what have we here, boys? A little bird lost in the woods."
His cronies chuckled, and Talsy backed away, unslung her hunting bow and notched an arrow. The roughnecks' leader guffawed.
"She's got some little pins, lads, look at that! Not a bird, but a little vixen, hey?"
"Leave me alone," Talsy said, aiming at his face. Even a hunting arrow through the eye could be deadly.
The leader's smile faded, and he unslung the longbow, drawing a wickedly barbed war arrow from the quiver on his back. "You want to play with fire, hey? Mine's bigger than yours, little girl."
The men sniggered and stepped closer. Talsy tried to keep them all in her sight, but two slunk along the sides of the alley behind her. "Call them off, or you get it!" she shouted at the leader, who grinned and began to bob and weave mockingly.
A brigand rushed her from the side, and she let fly the arrow with a vicious buzz. The leader yelled as it hit him in the shoulder, and his crony swept her off her feet, laughing. Talsy dropped her bow and pulled out her skinning knife, slicing her captor's cheek open to the bone. He bellowed and dropped her. Springing up, she dived for the shadows, but another man grabbed her wrist and swung her around.
Talsy's wild swing drew a bloody line across his chest, and he smacked the knife from her grasp. It landed somewhere amongst the garbage with a tinkle, lost in the gloom. The other men closed in around her. She sank her teeth into the hand that gripped her arm, and the brigand cursed and released her. Again she tried to make a run for it, but another ruffian tripped her up, and she sprawled in the refuse. A man pinned her down, grabbed her flailing arms and flipped her onto her back.
The leader appeared above her, his brows knotted and mouth twisted. Blood seeped down the front of his dirty brown tunic from the arrow wound in his shoulder. She had injured three out of the four, but was now helpless. While one man held her, another pulled at her clothes. He found her purse and mocked it, then tugged at the thongs that bound her jacket. The leader leered down at her.
"You're going to pay for this, bitch! I'm going to tear you apart!"
The cutthroat unfastened his trousers while the other man used his knife to cut her jacket's thongs, pulling it open. Talsy tried to kick whoever she could reach, but they laughed at her futile efforts. She yelled for help, and the man slapped her, making her eyes water and her ears ring.
"That's right, scream, bitch! I love to hear you scream," the leader snarled.
Talsy shrieked again when the man who straddled her beat her head on the ground, his hands around her throat.
A flash of fire ripped the air apart. An inferno engulfed them with the stench of burning and crackle of flames. Talsy screamed, and her tormentors swore in fearful confusion. The manifestation vanished, and she discovered that she was sheathed in blue fire. The man who pinned her down leapt away with a bellow of pain, beating the flames that had ignited on his greasy clothes. The others recoiled, brushing at singed brows and hair, cursing foully.
Talsy panicked, beating at the fire that licked her skin, but it did not burn. As her attackers retreated, it followed, surrounding her in a ring of flame six feet high. She scrambled to her feet and pulled her jacket closed, glaring at the wide-eyed men who stumbled back from the spreading fire, holding up their arms to ward off the heat. No heat touched her, and the blue flicker lighted the filthy slums with a ghostly glow. The leader cursed as he realised what was going on.
"Mujar! She's got a damned Mujar protecting her!" he shouted, and reached for his longbow. His cronies turned this way and that, scanning the surroundings. Talsy searched for a way to flee, sure that the ring would let her through, but the cutthroats were still all around her. The leader notched an arrow and looked around, then up.
"There!" He raised the bow, and she glanced up in horror. An owl perched on a nearby roof, its eyes glowing silver-blue in the flames. As the man took aim, Chanter spread his wings and leapt into the air. The man drew the bow and released the arrow with a savage, buzzing hiss. It struck the owl in a cloud of snowy feathers. His wings folded, and he plummeted, flapping.
"Chanter!" Talsy screamed, and tried to run to him as the circle of fire died. The air filled with a rush of wind and the sound of beating wings. The owl vanished, and Chanter sat up, gripped the arrow shaft that protruded from his flank and jerked it out. He started to rise to his feet, and the four men rushed him. Two crashed into him so hard they sent him sprawling on his back, and one plunged a knife into his belly. Chanter twisted with cat-like grace, trying to scramble up and flee. The men leapt on him, forcing him onto the ground. A savage jerk of his arm knocked a cutthroat sideways with a yell of surprise. The others pinned him down, beat him about the head with their clubs and stabbed him with rusty knives.
Chanter summoned Crayash again, the air screaming with fire, and wielded it in an explosion that forced the thugs to leap back with yells of pain, their skin reddened and hair singed. They were upon him again with renewed vigour, shouting foul obscenities and insults. Again he wielded the fire, with identical results. The men clearly knew he would not kill them. The flames were merely painful, which only made them cut him more.
"Chanter!" Talsy screamed, as blood oozed from his wounds. The air filled with the sound of beating wings. The men cursed as a swirling wind sprang up to buffet them, picking up dust that blinded them. One man fell back with a cry, pawing at his watering eyes, the others beat Chanter harder with the clubs, trying to knock him out. A rush of fire joined the wind in a maelstrom of blazing dust. A thug rolled away, beating at his burning clothes, another screamed as his hair caught alight. The Mujar's struggles weakened, but the thugs continued to rain blows on him.
"Chanter, kill them! Burn them!"
Talsy overcame her fear and ran forward to pick up a stone. The leader turned and raised a bloody knife. She stopped and threw the rock, which landed with a clatter in the darkness beyond. The cutthroat jumped towards her, making her stumble back with a cry as the knife drew a line of blood down her arm. She bent and picked up another stone, then froze at Chanter's cry.
"Talsy, run! Go! Don't let them catch you. I can't help you now!"
Talsy looked at the gang leader, who revealed rotting brown teeth in a feral grin. He stepped towards her, and she hurled the rock. It hit his chest, making him growl.
"Talsy, go!" Chanter's shout was cut off as one of his captors hit him in the face with a club. The swirling fire died as the Mujar slumped, unconscious.
Talsy hesitated only a moment longer, then, when the leader charged her, she shrieked and fled into the darkness. Garbage squelched under her feet and rats scurried from her path. Her sobbing breath drowned out the thuds and grunts of the beating that Chanter still underwent, even though he was unconscious.
By the time she stopped, she gasped through a throat raw from screaming, her lungs burnt, and she shook with shock and exhaustion. She leant against a shanty wall and gave in to uncontrollable sobs of misery and rage. One thought pounded in her brain and gave her solace. They could not kil
l him. No matter what they did, they could not kill him. They could certainly make him suffer, however, and ultimately they would throw him in a Pit. Because of her.
Chanter paid the price for her stupidity in getting lost in the slums and not seeking shelter from the prowlers when all the others had. Now she regretted asking him to protect her; better that she had been raped and beaten than for Chanter to be thrown into a Pit. Living death. Before that, he would suffer at the hands of cruel, pitiless men who hated Mujar with a fanatical intensity born of envy and contempt.
As her breath slowed and her pounding heart quieted, she regretted running so far to escape the sight and sounds of the brutal beating, and the stench of blood and sweat. She should have stayed close enough to follow them and rescue Chanter. Her cowardice filled her with shame and rage at her weakness and inability to defend herself, which had drawn the Mujar into this terrible situation. Afraid that she had lost him forever, she tried to retrace her steps, but in the darkness she soon realised she was hopelessly lost. Fresh tears coursed down her cheeks as she slumped to the ground in despair, hating herself for bringing such suffering to the gentle Mujar.
Chanter became aware that someone dragged him along the road by his legs. He wondered why Lowmen always vented their hatred in savagery and bloodletting, even when they knew they could not kill him. Perhaps to make him suffer, yet Mujar did not feel pain like Lowmen did. The real pain came with healing, not injury. Dolana filled him, draining his energy and will. He longed for Crayash, but it would not answer his call, denying him even a little warmth. His grasp on the Power had been snuffed when he had lost consciousness, and now he could not regain it.
His head bounced over rocks on a rough dirt street, then grated on smoother cobblestones. It seemed his captors had broken almost every bone in his body. Certainly his arms and legs were fractured, some of his ribs, and maybe a few others. Pain burnt in him with hot intensity, fuelling his dull rage. He opened his eyes.
The two men who dragged him stopped, and another banged on a stout door. After a few moments, a sour-face man opened it.
"What do you want?"
The man held up a lantern to examine the dirty group before him. He noted their burns and bruises with a scowl, clearly deducing that they had been in a fight. His eyes fell on Chanter, and he leant closer with an oath, then straightened with a startled curse.
"That's a Mujar!"
The thugs' leader leered. "We know. That's why we brought 'im. Thought you an' yer cronies might like to cut 'im up afore he goes in the Pit."
The man stroked the grey goatee that sprouted from his pointed chin. "Yes, yes, we would." He eyed the thug. "How much do you want?"
The cutthroat leader shrugged, trying to look casual before naming a high figure. The two wrangled for a few minutes before agreeing on a sum. The bearded man, whom Chanter deduced was a doctor, left to fetch it, then told them to bring the Mujar inside. They dragged Chanter into a cellar, his head bouncing on stone steps until he lost consciousness again.
After the street thugs left, Doctor Jashon Durb studied his acquisition with ill-disguised excitement, lighting another two lanterns. The Mujar lay still, his eyes closed. No breath stirred his chest, yet a pulse beat in his neck. His throat was cut from ear to ear, which explained his lack of respiration. From the odd angles of his limbs, the cutthroats had damaged him badly before they had brought him here. Still, it did not matter. No Mujar had been seen in a city for over twenty years, and he had always longed to dissect one. His fellow doctors, and the professors at the nearby medical college, would no doubt pay handsomely for the privilege of joining him in his study of Mujar anatomy, a mystery until now. He would consult with Tranton, the local expert on Mujar, for the best way to keep his subject under control while he carried out his experiments.
Although fairly sure that the Mujar was too badly injured to escape, and without water could not heal, Jashon dragged a heavy beam across the cellar and pinned him under it, just in case. Earthpower would keep his victim weak, and in the morning he would call Tranton. Satisfied, Jashon blew out the other two lamps and returned to bed, where his plump but comely wife waited.
Chanter woke in black stillness. A heavy weight lay across his hips, and agony coursed through him in endless waves. Dolana's creeping cold held him strongly, telling him that he was underground, and he wondered if he was in a Pit. He tried to call out to his brothers, but his jaw was broken and his throat slit, so his lips moved silently around the words. Surely they would know he was here? They would bring water for healing, if there was any.
Was the Pit dry? Would he lie in helpless agony for the next seventy-five years? The thought filled him with despair and a quiet rage that burnt beside the pain. If he was in a Pit, he was alone, for he sensed no other Mujar. He tried to sit up, but weakness held him down and his arms bent, broken above the elbows. The pain of his movements, though dulled by the cold of Dolana, brought a wave of sickness, and he slumped back. His only escape was sleep, and he consigned himself to it, grateful for the blessed unknowing of oblivion.
Talsy jerked awake with a gasp as a rat ran over her legs, and it scuttled away. The smell of sewage and putrefaction made her gag as she crawled from the shelter of the shanty in which she had spent the night. The chill morning air nipped her through her clothes, making her hug her fur jacket closer. Hunger clenched her gut, and the salt-stiffened lashes of her swollen eyes reminded her of the weeping that had lulled her into an uneasy sleep the night before.
The memory of Chanter's plight sent a pang through her, and she gazed up and down the filthy street, wondering which way to go. She had to find him. She could not abandon him now. Searching this filthy, squalid metropolis was a daunting task, but she would not shirk it. He had protected her, and she had promised rescue. The thought of the previous night's horrors brought fresh tears to sting her eyes, and she cursed, rubbing them as she headed down the alley.
Doctor Jashon Durb unlocked the door and hurried into the cellar at first light, eager to assure himself that the events of the previous night had not been a dream. The golden-skinned unman lay where he had left him, caked with dried blood. Jashon prodded him with his foot, but the Mujar's eyes remained closed. Satisfied that his victim was still helpless, Jashon left the cellar and donned his coat for the short walk to Tranton's house up the street. Ignoring the beggars who accosted him, he returned the greetings of merchants and housewives as he strode along the crowded, cobbled road. Houses loomed over it, washing strung across it from upper windows. Shops interspersed them, and their owners raised awnings and set out produce in anticipation of the day's trade.
Tranton's modest house leant drunkenly against its neighbour, one side undermined by wood borer. Once a wealthy man, the Mujar expert now eked out a meagre living from books and so-called Mujar charms; bits of black horse hair and dried digits supposedly cut from Mujar before they were sent to the Pit. The dried fingers and ears were Trueman, Jashon knew, and possessed none of the powers that Tranton claimed. Jashon's pounding on the bleached door evinced a response in the form of an angry shout from within.
The door squeaked open, and Tranton's scowling face thrust into the gap. "What the hell – Jashon!"
Jashon pushed past the elderly man, whose grey beard, stained yellow with spilt food, straggled across his chest like a malignant fungus. His greasy hair was pulled away from wrinkled features in a loose pony tail tied with a dirty leather thong. Jashon closed the door and faced his old friend, who stared at him in surprise. Tranton's astonishment turned to disbelieving delight when Jashon told him what he had in his cellar, and the Mujar expert insisted on inspecting the prize at once.
They hurried back to Jashon's house, where Tranton examined the captive with great excitement.
"By God, Jashon, I never expected to see one of these bastards again. They've become very rare. I heard of one that was thrown into a Pit about three years ago, and there are rumours of a few still bonded to hill tribes in the mountains. But
it's been many years since one wandered out of the forests and entered a city. Whoever caught him certainly made sure he isn't going anywhere."
"I want to dissect him," Jashon stated. "But I heard that some doctors tried once and the Mujar escaped."
"They were idiots. They put him on a table, and of course he was then able to summon the Powers. They got a bit burnt, and the Mujar turned into a bird. This one is far too badly injured to do anything. Even if he could turn into a bird, he'd have broken wings."
Jashon nodded and prodded the Mujar with his boot. "I want to move him to the medical college. How can we do that?"
"Easy. Put him in a sack and drag him. So long as he's on the ground, the Earthpower will keep him weak and stop him from summoning fire. Not that it would do him any good now. Since these yellow bastards won't kill, all their powers don't do them much good." He laughed. "You know the old saying, 'harmless as a Mujar'."
Jashon shook his head. "I know that. I'm only worried about him escaping."
Tranton grunted. "He can't. Without healing, he's helpless in any form."
Jashon fetched an old potato sack from the pantry, which they pulled over the Mujar. They lifted the heavy beam off him and dragged him up the cellar steps. In the street, they received many curious stares, but Jashon was a well-respected doctor, and the sight of him dragging a corpse, though odd, did not arouse any suspicions. The guard patrol offered to help, and Jashon allowed them to haul the Mujar to the college. It stood in an ornamental garden with a fountain in front of the entrance, an imposing stone edifice with a steep slate roof and pale stone walls fortified with black beams.
The guardsmen dragged the Mujar through the entrance hall and down a flight of steps to dump him in the laboratory, where crowd of curious doctors and students gathering as the men left. Jashon revealed his prize with a flourish and basked in the excited hubbub that followed. Several apprentices were dispatched to summon elder professors, who soon arrived to join in the excitement in a subdued fashion. The prospect of experimenting on a Mujar brought even the dean from the seclusion of his book-lined study.
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