by Ian Irvine
Maelys began to quote his famous last words before he was dragged off to prison, but they didn’t come out the least bit inspiring. They sounded like a lesson out of the Histories, and she could see that she was losing these dull, stolid folk. Living so far from anywhere, they must be suspicious of strangers, and while they knew of the God-Emperor’s dread power it was beyond imagination that his son should come to their insignificant little village.
That thought made it even harder to find the right words, but she tried again. ‘The Deliverer has come and he needs your aid. Will you help him begin the uprising against the God-Emperor …’
No, no! Why had she said that? She should have told them why it was important to aid Nish, and what they would get out of it. She could see in their faces that she’d offered them nothing but their doom.
‘We’re loyal worshippers of the God-Emperor, here, and he knows it,’ grated the headman. ‘We shall worship his Son, too, if the Father asks it of us, but we will never support the Son against the Father, who has given us the food we eat and the mead we drink, blessed be his name. Be off, tempter.’
‘Blessed be his name and all his works,’ echoed the crowd fervently.
Surely they didn’t think Jal-Nish had sent her to test their faith? ‘But I haven’t come from the God-Emperor to tempt you into betraying him,’ said Maelys. ‘I’ve come from his son, Nish.’
‘That’s a lie,’ said the headman, advancing on her, ‘for the Son is held in prison for his crimes against the Father. Begone back to your master, lad, and tell him so. Tell him that, even should every other village on Santhenar rebel, the hamlet of Byre remains steadfast. Jal-Nish is our God-Emperor now and for all time.’
‘For all time,’ hissed the crowd, in tones that sent worms wriggling up Maelys’s spine.
The headman was close now, and though his back was bent, he towered over her, treating her to a blast of sour mead fumes. ‘Were you a man full grown, I’d beat you black and blue for such blasphemy and send you to the God-Emperor in chains. Scurry back to your master, boy, whoever he is. Beg him to surrender to the God-Emperor’s mercy before he condemns you both.’
‘Please listen.’ How could she convince them that she was in earnest? Risking everything on a last desperate appeal, she said, ‘My master is Cryl-Nish Hlar, the son of the God-Emperor, and he curses Jal-Nish’s evil name. The God-Emperor is a stinking liar, a disgusting, deformed monstrosity who should have been slain long ago. I –’
She could not have chosen worse words. The entire village, from the most withered crone to the smallest child, let out a collective gasp of horror, then the adults surged forwards, brandishing sticks and clubs.
‘Wait!’ she cried, but they kept coming. ‘Listen –’
‘Blasphemous dog of a boy!’ cried the headman. ‘How dare you take the God-Emperor’s name in vain?’
‘The lout is a spy and a rebel who threatens us all,’ rasped a woman from the crowd. ‘He must be taught a lesson such that the God-Emperor will never question our loyalty. Beat him within an ell of his life and cast him out to die.’
‘Put out his eyes,’ said another woman, her own black eyes flashing in the firelight.
‘Sear the mark of the traitor bone-deep across his brow,’ said a third.
‘No!’ cried Maelys. She should have turned and run for her life, but she still thought that, if she could just find the right words, she could sway them. ‘You’ve got to listen –’
The headman held up his hand and the crowd hung back like a pair of dark wings unfurled behind him. ‘The rebel must be taught a stern lesson, but he must also live, that the God-Emperor hear of our loyalty, and how we repay those who dare to tempt us. We shall burn the mark of the traitor bone-deep into his brow, and beat him too, though not badly enough to cripple him. Take the scoundrel.’
It was hopeless. Maelys whirled and bolted, but hadn’t gone ten paces before she was tackled by a flying youth. She hit the ground hard and felt her binding cloth slip off. She tried to scramble to her feet but the youth’s hand locked around her ankle and before she could kick free two more lads piled onto her.
Maelys stopped struggling, for they were strong farm-hands and any one of them was her match. She went limp, hoping that they might relax and give her an opportunity for escape.
The first youth twisted her arm up behind her back until she had to bite her lip to avoid crying out, then turned her around and proudly forced her into the light. It was brighter now, for the lantern-bearers had closed into a circle around her. Her breasts bounced with every movement and they couldn’t possibly miss it. Under the God-Emperor’s rule, women were seldom beaten as harshly as men, but they were punished in other ways …
The headman stared at her, an unnerving gleam in his eye. He gestured to the youth, who let go of her arm and moved back, though only a step.
‘A girl,’ he said wonderingly, reaching out towards her chest but dropping his hand at the last moment. ‘That’s another matter entirely.’ He licked his flaking lips. ‘I can use a girl.’
Maelys took an abrupt step backwards and came up against the youth, who thrust her forwards again.
A bent old woman, even more aged than the headman, came lurching out of the crowd and delivered him a blow to the side of the head that sent him staggering sideways. ‘You’ll use her for nothing, you old fool,’ she said in a cracked hiss.
She stared at Maelys as if she could see into her soul. Reaching out with a dirty, trembling finger she touched Maelys on the lower lip, but whipped her hand back smartly. Her eyes narrowed. ‘That’s no innocent maiden, but a witch-slut sent to tempt drooling old men and weak-minded youths.’
She glanced over her shoulder towards the shadows to the left of the bonfire, and Maelys’s heart gave a lurch. Her eyes had been dazzled by one of the pole lanterns and she’d missed it before, but from this angle it was terribly clear – a wisp-watcher mounted on a tall post was pointing directly at her. How could she have been so careless?
The headman began muttering to the crone, though Maelys couldn’t make out what he was saying. She ran through her options. Wisp-watchers could see but not hear, and she didn’t see a loop-listener anywhere. Since Jal-Nish didn’t know her name and hadn’t seen her face, why would he be interested in some little conflict in an insignificant village? On festival nights, full of drunkenness and revelry, there must be thousands of fights, so she hadn’t given Nish away, yet.
‘She’s a temptress,’ the crone hissed, prodding the headman in the chest with brown-stained nails, ‘and if we don’t get rid of her she’ll destroy us all.’
‘What do you mean, Gyghan?’ said the headman, giving the wisp-watcher a fearful sideways glance. It was slowly rotating so its unblinking gaze swept across the village centre every few minutes.
‘The God-Emperor must have sent her to test us, to see if we remain faithful to him no matter what the temptation, and already you fail the test. Men!’
‘What are we to do with her?’
‘Kill her!’
Maelys’s blood turned to ice. What a fool she’d been. Why hadn’t she listened to Nish? How could she have thought to come here and manipulate him so crudely? She was doomed as surely as if she had fallen into the God-Emperor’s hands.
The headman’s eyes kept flicking back and forth between the crone and the wisp-watcher, with occasional furtive glances at Maelys’s breasts. He kept shaking his head. ‘But … but if she has come from the God-Emperor – we can’t kill one of his servants.’
‘He would expect no less of us,’ said Gyghan the crone. ‘What cares he for one servant when he has thousands? But he cares very much to know that his people remain faithful, no matter the temptation. The witch-slut preaches blasphemy and treachery. Once the ritual purifications are done, she must be slain as set down in the sacred books. The truth about her treachery must be burned into her body from forehead to toe, then she must be bound with chains and thrown in the river to drown.’
; ‘We have no chains.’
‘Then use rope and stones, idiot man! Begin.’
He stood there, hesitantly. ‘Can we not burn her on the bonfire?’
‘Burn a witch-slut here and her soul will be set free to haunt Byre until the end of time. Strip her down to a loincloth, before the Eye of the God-Emperor, then lash her to withies bent into a great circle.
‘My women will mix a barrel of the red earth from the river bank with thrice-blessed well water, and every man, woman and child must hurl the sacred mud at her until she is coated with it. Only when the mud dries and cracks from her slut-heat is she to be taken down and the words of treachery burnt into her with the red-hot poker.’ Gyghan raised her voice. ‘Bring the witch-slut to the Eye.’
Two brawny youths seized Maelys and hauled her after the crone, who was hobbling around the left-hand side of the bonfire, walking on the outsides of her feet as if it pained her to place them flat on the ground.
A young girl ran in, looking scared but determined. She reached out, drew back, reached out again and pinched Maelys painfully on the upper arm before darting away, grinning gleefully. Two more girls came from the other side, not quite as scared this time, pinching and poking Maelys, and then children ran from everywhere. Her arms were stinging by the time she’d been hauled around to the other side of the bonfire, where a battered wooden post protruded from the ground. It looked unnervingly like a whipping post and stood in the direct view of the Eye.
The crone shooed the children away and motioned to the youths to hold Maelys steady while four equally aged and snaggle-toothed women gathered around, inspecting her like a piece of meat on a butcher’s block.
‘Please,’ Maelys begged, ‘you’ve got it wrong. I –’
Gyghan slapped her across the face. ‘Be silent, witch-slut.’
Shortly a group of men came up from the river bank, dragging a number of willow boughs. The headman consulted the crone, who conferred with her followers then selected two long, slightly curved branches. The men stripped the twigs and side branches off, curved the boughs into three-quarter circles and bound them together where they overlapped to form a hoop a span and a half across, then tied it to the whipping post.
Maelys had to act now. Once they tied her to the hoop she was doomed. Wrenching her right hand free, she thrust it into her shirt and whipped the amulet out. Holding it out before her she roared, ‘Rurr-shyve, Rurr-shive!’ The amulet’s jade eyes began to glow, picking out the tracery of the flap-peter’s outline on the side facing her.
She rotated it so everyone could see, taking care to conceal it from the all-seeing wisp-watcher, which had swung in her direction. It remained silent, thankfully, but if it began to buzz, it would be sending what it saw to the tears.
The metal legs of the amulet unfolded, and the youths holding her choked and backed away. The crowd back-pedalled as well; a child began to cry. The headman stood his ground for a moment before taking two steps backwards, then running. The crowd surged after him towards the houses, all save for Gyghan.
‘Stand firm,’ she quavered. ‘This witch-slut has no power over the god-fearing.’
‘Oh yes I have!’ cried Maelys. If they were to call her witch, she’d act a witch to the best of her powers. She raised her arms to the heavens and roared, ‘Rurr-shyve, come for me, and if anyone from this accursed village stands in your way, smite them all the way into godless eternity.’ Her words sounded desperate, so she attempted a wild cackle. To her ears it sounded shrill, false and frightened.
However, the crone paled and turned to stare in the direction of the pinnacles and the camp, invisible in the darkness. The amulet grew warm in Maelys’s hands and for a moment she felt that sense of connection she’d had when she’d ordered Rurr-shyve to fly, and it had obeyed. She strained to reach it, to order it to come for her, though she felt sure she could not contact it from such a distance. Nothing happened; the connection slowly faded. Her arm shook and the tracery on the amulet began to fade. She’d failed and she was going to die.
Gyghan read her face. With a spreading, gap-toothed leer, she said, ‘The God-Emperor’s beasts refuse to answer her call. It’s proof that the witch-slut lies. Strip her! Bind her to the hoop.’ A gaggle of leering youths and hairless old men rushed forwards. ‘Back!’ she cried. ‘No lustful fool of a man shall touch the temptress.’ She gestured to her crones.
The men and youths retreated, torn between fear and resentment. Six crones advanced on Maelys, avoiding her eyes. She turned to run but a wall of youths blocked her way to freedom. She turned back, charged the crones and knocked the first two out of the way, but someone tripped her and she fell. Immediately the crones swarmed over her. She kicked and punched, desperate to get away, but there were too many of them and, despite their age, they were strong and wiry.
Two crones held Maelys’s arms until her struggles had exhausted her; another two stood on her shins. The remainder tore the shirt from her body, sneering as they exposed her, then cut away her other garments until all she had left were the rags of her trousers. Perhaps exposing the rest of her would prove too great a temptation.
They hauled her across to the hoop and bound her to the withies by her wrists. Long cords ran from her ankles to the lower rim of the circle, were stretched tight and bound there. They didn’t touch the amulet, though. They seemed afraid of it.
‘Well you might be afraid,’ said Maelys, loudly enough for everyone to hear, ‘for if you harm me you doom yourselves. My flappeter is coming, and once Rurr-shyve is finished with Byre village, no one will ever live here again.’
A great wail went up from the crowd but Gyghan raised a shaking hand. ‘The witch-slut lies. The witch-slut must die. Prepare the sacred mud.’ She turned to her fellows. ‘Headman, cleanse the pokers in the hottest part of the bonfire so we can burn the corruption and evil out of her. All hail to the God-Emperor.’
‘All hail to the God-Emperor,’ echoed the villagers.
Maelys jerked furiously, tearing the skin of her wrists, but the ropes didn’t give an ell.
TEN
Nish was so immersed in his troubles that he hardly noticed the passing of time. He ate some dried meat from the saddlebags, washed it down with rank water from a water skin and resumed his vigil. Where could he go that his father would never find him?
Unfortunately he had only the vaguest idea where he was. Mazurhize and Morrelune lay in the southern section of the mighty mountain chain that ran up the east coast of the continent of Lauralin, not far from the coastal city of Fadd, but it was a land Nish knew only from maps. And after days of flying, much of it in cloud or fog as they followed the winding valleys, he was lost.
Maelys’s original destination of Hulipont was in the mountains north of the ancient Aachim city of Stassor, but he must assume Hulipont had been taken by his father by now. There was no refuge at Stassor either, for the city had been forbidden to all outsiders for more than a thousand years. Besides, after the destruction of the nodes and the failure of the Secret Art, even eternal Stassor could have crumbled.
There must be places in Lauralin too empty, remote or rugged for Jal-Nish to bother about. Many Aachim had gone to Faranda at the end of the war but Jal-Nish probably held sway over them as well. However, Meldorin Island, where the war began a hundred and sixty years ago, had been abandoned to the lyrinx in the last years of the war and must still be a largely empty land.
But Nish didn’t want to hide from Jal-Nish. He wanted what ordinary people had – a measure of freedom to live their lives without interference. He couldn’t live in fear of his father, constantly looking over his shoulder.
There were more distant lands on the other side of the world, where he doubted his father had ever been, but he had no way of reaching such places. Rurr-shyve could cross small mountains and narrow seas but not oceans, since it had to land several times a day to feed. And even if he could take the flappeter, what could he do about Maelys? She had to be protected until she could be returned
to her family, though unfortunately Maelys didn’t know where they were hiding.
Nish was immersed in these gloomy thoughts when Rurr-shyve reared up so suddenly that the top of the small tree it was roped to whipped back and forth, shedding twigs and leaves on his head. Lowering its tail, it used it as a lever to raise its long neck as high as it would reach. Its head darted back and forth, sniffing the air. Its compound eyes took on a ruddy gleam in the firelight and it sucked air through its breathing tubes with a revolting snotty gurgle. After holding that pose for a minute the gleam faded and it sank down again.
There was no way of knowing what had disturbed it; the creature was too alien. Nish was recalling his travels in Meldorin, and trying to think of the best place to head for, when it occurred to him that Maelys had been gone rather a long time.
The moon had moved a third of the way across the sky since she’d left, so the best part of four hours must have passed. More than enough time for her to walk to the village, spend an hour there and walk back.
Still, she wasn’t a child. She’d eluded his father’s Militia, controlled an alien flappeter and killed its rider, a man armed and experienced at hand-to-hand combat. What harm could she come to? he rationalised. He paced back and forth across the camp site, still thinking about Meldorin, but his thoughts kept returning to Maelys and he realised, to his chagrin, that he’d changed his previous view of her capabilities to suit himself.
A young woman, out alone in the dark, was never completely safe from villains. Or she might have fallen and broken her leg. Even a twisted ankle could be fatal in this wilderness, where savage creatures hunted day and night. Should he go after her? But there was no path to the village and she might have gone any way, so how would he find her?
