Lemos smiled faintly. ‘I don’t think Daylith could do so anyway. He is a very young Dark Lord, and has completed scarcely a quarter of his training. He has a talent for gateways though.’
Leaving the workroom, they walked towards the outer door. Lemos caught Tika’s arm and held a finger against his lips as they reached the entrance to the den. He pulled her quickly past and hurried her on outside.
‘Emas is inclined to haul in anyone to help with things. Help, to her, means sitting giving orders while you dust and polish.’
Tika came to a stop, staring at Lemos in disbelief.
‘She actually gets you to polish?’
Lemos looked glum. ‘And The Bear.’
Tika’s mouth dropped open, but just then Farn charged towards her before she could respond. Farn allowed his mind speech to be heard by the mage.
‘You’re going to Kelshan tomorrow. Jemin’s decided. I will be coming too of course.’ His eyes flashed and whirred in excited anticipation.
‘And me.’ Shea appeared at Farn’s side, her expression full of determination.
‘Quite a party, all in all.
Tika glanced to her left and saw Cyrek strolling round the side of The Bear’s house with Sket. Tika couldn’t read either his expression or his tone, but he seemed relaxed, as if he was commenting on a pleasant social trip. Tika was aware of Kija approaching with Storm, although Kija’s mind made no contact with hers. Cyrek rested a long fingered hand lightly on Farn’s shoulder.
‘I think there needs to be a small discussion about that.’
His gold eyes were tranquil, his voice calm, but Tika knew that Cyrek was not going to permit Farn to travel to Kelshan. Part of her felt relief: Farn had recovered better than she had dared hope from the mental torment he had suffered. But another part of her longed for his company on this venture. She met Sket’s steady gaze. Nothing would stop him accompanying her, not the Dark Lord Cyrek in either the form of this mild, rather elegant man, nor as the vast Dragon shape he could apparently shift into as he wished.
Farn lowered his head towards Cyrek. ‘What is there to discuss?’ he asked.
‘Several things,’ Cyrek replied. ‘Why don’t you and Storm show me how you catch fish – I’ve heard that you’ve caught many near the Falls.’
Storm was in the air before Cyrek finished speaking. Cyrek stepped away from Farn and the smell of burnt cinnamon filled the air. Farn was lifting from the ground when Cyrek’s Dragon shape swept up beside him, dwarfing both him and Storm.
‘Lord Cyrek will dissuade them.’ Kija spoke in their minds. She gazed down at Tika. ‘It would be unwise for us to be seen in those Kelshan lands. Gossamer tells me there are few if any tales of the Kindred among her people.’
Tika reached to stroke the beautiful long face. Kija bumped her forehead against Tika’s.
‘You have only to call.’ She spoke to Tika’s mind alone. ‘We will come. You know that, child.’
Sket strolled over, his arm across Shea’s shoulders.
‘Those three engineers are coming,’ he said. ‘Jemin said they needn’t, but they’re insisting.’
He watched her reaction. Sket knew that Tika would like things to go back to how they had been, no more fighting, no more grief. But he had observed how people were being drawn to her now. Sket understood that the last thing Tika wished for, was to be a leader of more than the small group of friends who’d set out together from Sapphrea, not so very long ago. But people were gathering around her now, and looking to her to make decisions. A full turn of the seasons, that was all the time that had passed since he and Motass had been called to teach basic weapons’ skills to Tika and Mim.
She still looked scarcely out of childhood until you looked into her eyes. Those strangely silvered eyes held ages in their depths now. Sket glanced down at the top of Shea’s dark head. This one was so like the Tika he’d first met. He wasn’t a wise man, he was just an efficient armsman. But he had pledged himself to Tika’s service, and this child had done the same. Perhaps they were to be the founder members of the Lady Tika’s Guards? He pushed such silly thoughts out of his head as Kija turned back to the verandah where Emas had emerged with a basket of sewing.
Tika slid her arm through Sket’s and leaned her head against his shoulder briefly.
‘Are you sure your hand and your head are fully healed?’ she asked.
‘Course they are.’ He held out his left hand. The skin was smooth over the knuckles beyond which his fourth and fifth fingers had once grown. ‘Jakri did a good job on that. And you must know my head’s all mended.’
Tika probed with a sense grown so much more powerful, and found the slight swelling in Sket’s brain was completely gone. He grinned at her, knowing she’d somehow inspected his head but feeling nothing at all.
‘So tell me about these engineers?’ She watched Lemos heading down through the village as she spoke. Surely he wasn’t hiding from his sister? Surely not!
Shea walked backwards in front of Sket and Tika as they went to the village’s northern gate.
‘Essa told me about it,’ she began. ‘There were four of them. Essa says all engineers are mad. If they don’t start out mad, that’s how they end up.’
They’d passed the guardian stone bear and Shea clambered onto a slab of rock. She sat cross legged and prepared to enlighten her audience.
‘Anyway, Dog – the one whose leg you fixed – she said she’d been worried about Rose for quite a while. He got caught in a couple of explosions when they were clearing some mine tunnels.’ She waved vaguely to the east. ‘Dog said he’d been shaky and often he didn’t seem to hear when people talked to him. Dog sent Onion and Darrick on along the trail. They were going to blow up some of the mountain to block the way back north, once all the guards were past them.’ Shea paused for breath.
Tika and Sket leaned against the rock, paying close attention.
‘Dog thought Rose was with her. When she saw him scampering back this way, she chased after him. Before she could quite catch him, he climbed over the side of the path towards the guards.’ Shea stopped again.
Tika nodded for her to continue.
‘Dog says they usually carry nine or twelve poppers, but she now believes Rose had more than that. If you drop one, or bang it down hard – pouf!’ She threw her arms wide. ‘Well, Dog thinks Rose just jumped. Straight on top of the guards below him. She said Onion could only find Rose’s hat, all the rest of him was scattered over the trail. Onion thinks there were about twenty guards killed too.’
Tika studied the girl. Her cheeks were flushed, her hazel eyes sparkled. She was more animated than Tika had seen her. Tika sincerely hoped Shea wasn’t planning to learn how to be an engineer. Sket caught her eyes and she knew the same thought had gone through his mind. Although neither had spoken, Shea seemed satisfied by their reaction to her story. She pulled up one of her trouser legs.
‘Dog fixed this for me.’
Sket and Tika saw the straight hilt of a small knife protruded from the girl’s boot.
‘Dog says it’s a useful place to keep an extra weapon.’
Tika suspected that she might possibly grow tired fairly quickly of the words “Dog says” but simply nodded.
‘They’ve had more poppers sent up here, but they’re not sure how many you might want them to take.’
Tika swallowed and avoided Sket’s eyes. ‘Well, I expect Jemin will tell them.’
Shea looked surprised. ‘They aren’t under his orders. They answer to you. They told me.’
Ah, thought Sket, and so it will go. More and more, looking to Tika as their authority.
‘Oh. Well then, I suggest they’ll know best, won’t they.’ Tika hoped she at least sounded confident.
All three jumped at a rumbling shout from beyond the trail which led north. Kerris raced into sight, shrieking with laughter. A heartbeat later, The Bear appeared, the pack on his shoulder seeming like a toy. Kerris slowed as she neared and her smiles faded. She stared from Tika, to She
a, to Sket.
‘It’s all right Kerris,’ Tika said quickly. ‘We aren’t going to make you leave here. It is for you to choose.’
Kerris glanced back. The Bear had reached them and stood beside the child. She slipped a hand into his massive fist and looked at Shea.
‘I’d like to stay here, if you please. But if you think I should do something else, then of course I will.’
The Bear frowned but said nothing. Shea slid off her rock and crouched by her sister.
‘From now on Kerris, we do as we wish. We take no orders.’
The Bear got in before Tika. ‘Oh yes you do. If I say that Kerris is to tidy her room, or go hunting with my son, or play a game of snap-the-rat with me, then so she will.’
Both girls peered up at the huge man. They saw the frown, and they saw the twinkle in the dark honey eyes. Shea straightened while Kerris’s smiles returned.
‘I don’t mind doing those things,’ she agreed.
‘And you will obey any order given to you when we are in Kelshan,’ Tika spoke sternly and fixed Shea with her fiercest glare. She was disconcerted by Shea’s grin.
Sket had a brief fit of coughing.
‘Well,’ he finally managed. ‘If that’s sorted out, perhaps we should find out what the Prince has planned for us?’
Tika and the girls began to walk back down to the village, and The Bear gave Sket a solemn wink. The Bear put a hand on Sket’s shoulder, holding him back long enough to let Tika and the girls walk out of earshot.
‘Will she take the Dragons?’
Sket felt the deep voice vibrate down The Bear’s arm into his own body.
‘Cyrek says not.’
The Bear nodded and resumed walking to the village entrance. ‘Lemos told me they are spirit bound, Tika and the young blue one. I thought they had to stay close?’
Sket slowed, watching Tika cross the open space in front of The Bear’s house.
‘When they were apart before, it caused them both great distress,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘But Farn is so much calmer since the First Daughter restored him. And Tika is changed. I have been surprised that Farn goes off so happily without Tika. I know they can keep in mind contact with each other at quite long distances, but he would not have left Tika for whole days before.’
‘I spoke with Gold Wing and her mage. Gedlin was there too.’
At Sket’s questioning look The Bear elaborated.
‘Gedlin is the mage of the Mad Goats. He is considered one of the most powerful among the tribal mages.’
Sket shook his head, grinning. ‘I understand Bear tribes, and Eagles, but Mad Goats?’
The Bear’s laughed boomed across the rocky ground. ‘They keep herds of goats but there is a plant – Lemos would tell you what it is – which blooms very soon after the snows melt. If the goats can get to the flowers before they have turned to seed and eat them, they go crazy.’ He shrugged. ‘They are a proud tribe, the Mad Goats, and often over the many generations, their mages have gained the most respect.’
‘So what did Gedlin have to say?’ Sket asked as they continued past the stone guardian.
‘He said the binding between them had changed. He said it had both loosened and tightened.’ The Bear slapped Sket’s back, nearly sending him sprawling. ‘Mages eh? Love to talk in riddles. But he said she would triumph eventually.’
Sket snorted. ‘Really helpful then?’
The Bear gave a roar of amusement and Sket moved prudently out of reach, just in case the man decided to slap his back again. He suspected his shoulder blades might well have been displaced from the first friendly blow.
‘I will be coming with you to Kelshan.’
The growl underlying The Bear’s words made Sket decide to attempt no reply. Instead, he went back to an earlier comment.
‘The mage said the bond between Tika and Farn had changed. Would they have noticed it?’
The Bear paused, his foot on the steps to his house. ‘Oh yes. Gedlin was clear. Their binding has altered and they know it. But to what extent that will change either of them, or their closeness, only they could tell you.’
He climbed the steps and disappeared within, leaving Sket to mull over his words. Sket glimpsed the massive shapes of Menagol and Essa coming up to the village from the meadow and he decided he would find those three engineers. He liked their company and exchanging far fetched accounts of their various battles. He quite liked Dog. She didn’t terrify him as Essa did. Although, thinking about those poppers they seemed to love as if they were their children, and having seen one demonstrated, Sket thought he should perhaps revise that opinion.
Jemin’s officers had wandered off in search of a meal while the Prince lingered over rough maps of the different levels within the Citadel. Gossamer Tewk strolled in, peered over his shoulder and jabbed a finger onto the map.
‘That’s wrong. The stairs are over there.’
Jemin glared at her. ‘General Whilk made no mention of that.
She shrugged, hitching herself onto a corner of the table. ‘I’d be surprised if a general really knew all the servants’ staircases and passageways.’
Jemin’s glare remained. ‘And I would expect him to know every point of access to the government departments throughout the building.’
Gossamer shrugged again. ‘Ask Waxin Pule. He’d know. Is he coming with us by the way?
Jemin shook his head. ‘He is an old man. His years in Kelshan have cost him highly in regard to his health. Dark healers can alleviate his problems but not cure them. He has earned a peaceful retirement.’
‘Peaceful retirement?’ Gossamer scoffed. ‘Don’t you understand anything about that Splintered Kingdom? No one is heading for a peaceful retirement with that Crazed One interfering more and more in our lives.’
Jemin regarded her. She’d spent nearly all her time here sketching and studying the great mural in The Bear’s den. He had also noticed how she sat apart from the crowd, but listening and watching. And, he’d wager, storing away all the information she gleaned for later consideration. He perched himself on the table as well.
‘Have you reached any conclusions about that picture?’
She shot a quick glance at him. ‘Lemos told me there are others. None quite so big as the one here, but nearly all the tribes have some sort of painting which they consider illustrates their history. The Eagles’ picture is in a cave which they regard as sacred to their ancestors. I wish I’d known that earlier.’
Jemin waited but she seemed lost in thought.
‘Obviously I don’t remember, but I did ask General Whilk if there were any like it in Kelshan.’
Gossamer looked at him with interest. ‘Are there?’
‘He said there was something similar in my father’s study, but he’d never paid much attention to it.’
‘It fascinates me,’ Gossamer admitted. ‘But I feel I’m missing something about it. I didn’t even notice the Dragons until Emas pointed them out.’
‘The tribes all say that once, when time began, there was a Dragon tribe, but all of them think that is just an invented tale.’
Gossamer pushed off from the table and began to prowl the room. ‘I asked Tika if there was anything like it in her lands, but she said not. She said she’s seen carvings, free standing statues in a few places. But nearly all decoration in Sapphrea is of patterns – squares, circles, spirals – made of coloured stones. In some areas she said jewellery is made but only simple things. She has never seen paintings on walls and I had to explain the idea of portraits as we have them in Kelshan.’
‘Did you see any of the pictures within the Palace?’ Jemin asked.
Gossamer sat back on the table. ‘Yes. They interested me when I noticed them. I thought they were like little windows showing the world outside. There was one, in the bedroom Shea had, of the seashore. That’s the one I first really looked at. Then I realised they were everywhere, pictures of all kinds of things. I wish I could make pictures like that.’ She looked at Jemi
n, surprised she’d said so much to him.
‘You could learn. There are teachers in the Academy in Karmazen.’
‘I’m too old to learn,’ she said dismissively.
But Jemin realised that somehow he had touched something in this strange woman and she in turn had allowed him a glimpse of her inner self. He also saw that she was on the point of withdrawing and he turned casually back to the maps.
‘So the stairs should be over here?’ He waved the map under her nose.
‘Yes, along there.’
She met his eyes. ‘What will we find in Kelshan?’ She’d lowered her voice although they were alone in the room. ‘Tika felt the creature was nearby when she went for Kerris.’
Jemin’s expression was bleak. ‘I know. But I can wait no longer. That woman will bring Kelshan to complete ruin. The wild clans are on the verge of rebellion and several of the states within the Confederacy are deeply unhappy with the taxes she imposes on their trade goods. She must be stopped, before all of Kelshan becomes a killing ground.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Hag drifted lazily on the currents of air in the night sky high above Kelshan. She could see, far beneath her, the specks of light clustered around the harbour area. But they didn’t interest her. What she was watching and waiting for were the sudden bursts of power. She cackled when she sensed surges of that power in quick succession. She tilted a wing, coming round in a long looping curve, dropping lower until she could pick out buildings clearly along the threads of streets.
A great grey stone building loomed to the north of the harbour, high above the surrounding houses. She adjusted her angle of flight and floated down to land on the pinnacle of one of four towers. She settled her feathers and waited again. Hag noted that the bursts of magic came mostly from beyond this building, from the tangled streets of the lower area. There was something within this place but it was solitary, insignificant compared to the other magic.
Hag’s blood tingled with it. She strutted restlessly round the tower and hopped onto the parapet which enclosed an expanse of flat roof. Her excitement grew when power burst from a section of the town to her right. She took flight and swept on her broad wings directly towards the focal point. She knew she was very close when mist seemed to blur the air in front of her, buffeting her from her course. She squawked in both annoyance and alarm. She found herself pushed sideways and landed awkwardly beside a chimney.
Dark Realm: Book 5 Circles of Light series Page 35
