The monster Ametheus was far from gone; the truth would have made those ignorant farmers stand up clutching their hoes and harrows, looking west to where Orenland ended, looking west to where he had made his home.
Turmodin.
He had claimed a large headland that thrust into the sea amid the thrashing waves of the shallows, where the great Cascarrik River, carrying the effluent of its long journey, stained its delta with layers of silt. There he had fashioned a refuge from mud and rock, and therein lay his treasure. Few would have considered the restless roiling nebulae to be treasure; none would have exchanged good Kingdom gold for them, but in the end that might have served everyone better, had the people of the lowlands known what was to come.
For there, in his cavern that would one day be the basement of his mighty Pillar, lay the nodes of Chaos.
Ametheus had spent the years before his fateful visit to the wizards’ college collecting the nodes, according to the vision of his dream. The nodes were easy for him to find but as scattered as windblown seeds. Wherever there was strife, fire, quakes, conflicts or even quarrels, a node was present—a cluster of energy invigorated by the many battles and wasted blood that had twisted around them. He plucked them from the sites, as unnoticed as a beggarman collecting litter. Where he passed there was sickness and strife, but where he had come from the land was healed, and peace descended upon people who had never known it. In a way his work allowed Order to spread, for he took the nodes away to his refuge.
In Turmodin alone, the raw Chaos mounted, waiting for Ametheus to be ready to wield it upon the world. Thus it had been when he had left the refuge to find Annah in the college. When he returned, he was ready.
Brother Seus experimented with the silver essence, and brother Amyar began to break things with their fists in rage, but he didn’t try to stop Seus for he understood their need for power to exact revenge. The two brothers became closer, and Ethan was dominated by old anger and visions of impending doom.
He tried not to think about what he was doing, instead he thought of the effect he wanted, and allowed the inspiration from another time to come through Seus. It was rare for the three of them to be so unified, to be sharing a task without fighting, but the common enemy bonded them. They worked upon a spell to end the wizards, to destroy those who wielded magic, a spell that would be reactive, and permanent, and self-seeding. The wild animals of the delta suffered greatly as Ametheus tried time and time again to understand his unruly efforts, but perfection was not in his nature, and after many attempts he realised he should leave control aside. The spell should be raw chaos, infused only with the desire to spread. When it struck fertile magical soil it should multiply, when it found anyone using power it should link them to a node. It would be like a plant, it would be a vine, with its roots in his refuge and its feelers creeping outward through the traces of Order, along slipways, through village streets, up into the air, wherever it wished to seek for magic-users.
He knew what he was devising would ruin the face of Oldenworld. It would live by its own rules; it would run and run as long as there was magic in the world to nourish it. He might never be able to stop it. It might even turn upon him, in the end.
Then he thought of the target, and his mind was made up. He howled with rage.
He raised his arms to the sky, and sent the first wildfire upon the college in Kingsmeet.
After that, he hunted the remaining wizards.
At night, a fearsome fire-dappled face spoke to him, and he dreamt of falling cities and countries aflame and broken roads and dead people carried upon the rivers of his tears. He dreamt of destruction.
20. A RIDDLE IN THE WOOD
“If you understood everything that I did,
then I would not be a riddler, would I?”—Zarost
Ashley came to with a strange hot breath in his ear. He was lying in something soft and wet with dew. His shoulder ached and he was cold. He looked up. A horse was close, or something that once was a horse.
He sat up in alarm, and tumbled out of the ferns onto a swathe of grass. The creature shied and tossed its head. It sensed his surprise. It’s okay, it’s okay, he reassured her. You’re just a horse with a beak where there shouldn’t be one, and wings, great big white feathered wings. A gryphon, of a kind, a legendary monster that shouldn’t be real.
It all came back to him. They had crashed into the forest canopy. It was a miracle they were both still alive. He checked himself over for injuries, but apart from the stiff shoulder and a stabbing discomfort in his chest that might be a broken rib, he was hale.
Sugarlump—Princess—hadn’t fared so well. A great red slash stained her white coat, but the blood had stopped running from the wound. He hoped it would stay uninfected. As if sensing his concern, she came close again and pushed her nose into his hand. He stroked her forehead, and rubbed the edges of her beak. She whickered, obviously pleased with the sensation. But the bit and bridle looked painfully tight, wrapped around her snout like a baling wire. As if becoming aware of it only as Ashley thought about it, she bit down and there was a sharp snip. She bit right through the steel and spat the pieces out. The bridle dangled loosely beside the deadly beak.
“What are we to do with you?” he asked. His pack was still fastened behind the loose saddle. He worked the girth free, and untied her load. She nudged him gratefully. He supposed that he wouldn’t need a halter to catch her if he needed to ride her. She was so close in his mind he could almost see the world through her eyes. Just a thought from him and she would come to be ridden. She blew heavily through her nostrils then ambled away to crop the grass nearby. Her tail swished lazily, a tail of barbed silvery wires.
Something had changed with his ability, he’d felt it when they had emerged from Eyri. It was as if a lid had been lifted off his head, and he could reach out far and wide with his thoughts. He’d never known what it was like to be a horse, but now he knew. Princess felt that he was her friend. He had helped her when things had become scary, and so he was a good man. And now… grass. Life was simple, as a horse. Except that with her new beak, trying to crop grass wasn’t working very well. Ashley wondered if she’d have to find something new to eat. What did gryphons eat?
A good man he may be, but he was a cold man. The flight had chilled him to the bone, and the huge trees of the forest kept the air cool and damp. Ashley scratched through the disturbed contents of the pack and found the tinder and flint. A few leaves that looked dry lay around the bole of the nearest tree, as well as a pile of bark which had fallen from the scabrous white trunks. Once the moisture had dried from the kindling, he had a great blaze going. As he thawed out he chewed on some dried meat Mulrano had supplied. It took some chewing, but it was good. He washed it down with water from his skin.
Some time had passed since the morning, he supposed. The odd ray of sunlight lanced down through the great trees from above. He had no way to orient himself in the forest. He couldn’t tell if he was facing east, north, south or west, toward Tabitha and the men or away from them.
He had to rejoin the group. There was too much about Oldenworld he didn’t understand. Ashley had expected to be part of Tabitha’s group all the time. She knew where she was going. He had only joined her quest because he’d wanted to help, and he’d hoped to spend some time with her, apart from learning some of her magic. She was the Wizard. She would have devised some protection against the strange wasteland, but he didn’t even have one sprite.
Something cracked and rustled in the forest. Princess lifted her head from the turf, her ears pricked forward.
He tensed.
Silence again.
His thoughts drifted back to Tabitha again. He was sure he would be able to sense her presence if she was close enough, maybe within a league. Ashley leant back against the tree trunk, and tried to reach out with his mind—out, out, outward. Trees trees, trees, a river, trees, a collection of unfamiliar people. At least the forest was inhabited. He took a deep breath and tried again, op
ening himself to the fluctuations of mental energy.
Princess stamped and breathed heavily at his side. He sensed a creature who was hunting, an angry simple mind who was busy tearing through the forest, looking for the food that always ran and hid beneath the vegetation. It was close.
With a squeal and crackle of broken twigs, a boar rushed from the undergrowth beside them: a mean-eyed brute with horrible tusks. Ashley shot to his feet. The tree at his back was too smooth to climb. Princess was already shying away on the far side of the clearing. Only his pack was close at hand, with the wooden staff looped through its straps.
The boar made directly for him with lowered tusks, which appeared wickedly sharp, the ends stained a reddish brown. Ashley hoped it was from earth, not blood. He lunged for the staff, snatched it up, and ran. The boar was aiming for his heels. Its angry thoughts were plain to read—it knew that when things were running, they couldn’t attack, and so it could run all the way into those soft legs, and tangle the tusks in them.
Then, the goring run. Then the feeding.
The cruelty of the pig’s thoughts curdled Ashley’s blood. He had known of the forest boars around Llury. They were dangerous if angered, but they ate roots, compost and waste. They’d eat anything, really, but he was sure they did not hunt people. This pig was different. Its skin was scaly and rusted, and looked as hard as iron. It ran fast. It was only five paces behind him, then three. He knew it wanted him to carry on running, for then it would win.
He turned, and brought the staff down upon its head with a double-handed swing, but he was too late, the pig was upon him. The staff rebounded from the iron head. The boar took both his feet out from under him. He hit the ground hard. By the time he had regained any sense of where he was, the boar was returning for another charge.
Soft flesh blood.
He knew where it was even though his back was to it. He crouched, and at the last moment, he leapt into the air. His ankles hurt. The boar surged underneath him and squealed in frustration. No blood, Ashley thought desperately, putting the suggestion into its mind the way he did with Princess. No blood, no food.
The pig slowed as it turned.
No food? Still can kill it, kill it, kill! Its mean little eyes glittered. It lowered its head and trotted closer. This time it was going to make sure he couldn’t escape. He backed away, prodding at it with the end of his staff. It wasn’t scared of him. Yet.
Ashley planted a suggestion deep in its mind. The man is danger, great danger.
The boar tossed its head, and grunted in disgust, but it stopped advancing. Ashley stared into its eyes.
The man likes to eat pig.
Its nose wrinkled as it scented him.
The man is hungry now.
It stamped its hooves.
The man has made a fire to burn the pig on.
The boar made a querulous noise in its throat. It didn’t like fire.
Run run run! he told it. The thought was deep in its mind. Burning pig, squealing pig, dying pig!
It turned and bolted, running before it knew why, then only knew that it must run. There was a bad man behind it, a deadly man—a hunter. Pig with its head hacked off! Pig roasting on a spit! Pig with an apple in its mouth! Ashley projected the thoughts until it was far away, so far he could sense it no more. Then he sat down heavily.
His mind was fizzing, he was so lightheaded. He laughed with relief. It had been simple once he’d got the feel for it. He had shaped the thoughts from the raw stuff within the boar’s mind. It was a simple mind, no doubt, but he had controlled its thoughts, planted ideas in its silly head. He called to Princess, and added a reassuring thought to calm her. She trotted to him from nearby in the woods and snorted nervously.
“It’s all right, he’s gone now.” He scratched her neck. She rolled a doubtful eye at him, but settled down soon enough.
Ride? she wondered.
“Yes, let’s find out what kind of a place we are in.”
_____
In the narrow windblown neck overlooking the lakes squatted a hard stone stronghouse, much aged, its garrets crumbled and ill-repaired, its heavy slate tiles moss-filled and uneven, and the low stacked walls of the sheep-pens hiding under brambles. The outlying buildings were abandoned.
Passover had once been a vital link between the sovereign state of Korin and Moral Kingdom in the lowlands, and it had flown the flags of the Six-sided Land and the Amalgam of Lakelanders too. Trade had flourished, for it was here that the dissident Cleric of Qirrh had settled after he had walked the world. It was here that he had put his hand to map-making and founded a legacy on the strength of his penmanship and clever bartering, continued by his descendants. It was to this trading station that Twardy Zarost came, to find the last copy of the Book of Is. He was a backward forecaster, walking through his own work of prophecy and watching his visions escape ever more like desperate rats from a sack. He’d got it slightly wrong. A prophet should never doubt, he knew this, for then the vision of other prophets would come to pass instead of his own. But once one doubted, Zarost thought, he doubted that doubt could be undoubted.
It was dark and acrid in the old trade hall.
A moth zuzzed over Twardy Zarost’s head, wallowing like a wide-bellied ship on high seas. After regarding him for a moment, it continued noisily through the gloomy room. It was huge. If it grew anymore, it would be a bird, but it still had the same mothy brain. It was heading for the light, Zarost mused, as they always did. The streaked cresset had a tall flame dancing on its end. The moth bashed into a low beam on the way to its target. It sank to the floor in dizzy spirals, temporarily thwarted on its holy quest for the light.
A man watched Zarost. Clumps of lanky black hair hung low over his rough face. He sat at a single table under the light. He was drinking from a cloudy bottle; he was drinking alone. Zarost didn’t expect he ever kept company for long. One could tell a lot about a man from the kind of boots he wore. These were dirty, scuffed boots—fighter’s boots—the kind that would have metal sewn secretly into the toe.
The man flicked his foot gently under the moth. It fluttered upward. Zarost was surprised at the gentle gesture, which seemed odd from the owner of such a crusty boot.
Flash! A winged blackened shape fell from the flame overhead. The man put out his hand, and the dead moth landed in his palm. He dipped the crisped husk into a dish of sticky liquid then threw his head back and dropped the appetiser into his mouth. He stared at Zarost as he munched. It was no accident that his table was positioned directly beneath the lamp. There was a more sinister effect too—whoever approached the table would be looking directly into the flickering light, and would find it difficult to see into the gloom on either side. Zarost waited just inside the doorway. He wanted to be sure he had counted all the henchmen before he stepped up to bargain. Things had changed in the House of Rohm.
The Passover trading post was under new management.
A lanky redhead stood in the corner, oiling a chain. He fretted over each link as if to clean it of a persistent stain. Zarost noted him as a danger. Someone who took such loving care of a weapon was usually someone who would delight in using it. The man was pretending not to watch the room.
Three others were rummaging through assorted caskets. One was a visitor, a heavy-set grey-skinned Lûk. The two men who accompanied him showed him something, and he shook his head. The visitor would likely not get involved on either side should there be trouble, but his attendants were part of the house crew.
The bigger of the attendants flashed an angry glance at Zarost. He looked to be as strong as an ox. Beside him, the last crew-man looked harmlessly small, with furtive, delicate hands. Zarost was not fooled. These men were mercenaries. The small man would use a throwing knife, whereas the brute would prefer to use his fists or a heavy weapon. A chain, a club, a knife—the most dangerous man in the house was the small one, because he would attack the fastest.
The place was decrepit. A tattered shroud flapped in a gaping
window. A sagging door at the back of the room showed the flicker of candlelight beyond. Some busted furniture huddled against a wall, waiting to be burnt in the cold hearth. The seats had been replaced with upended wine barrels. A pile of feathers lay in a corner. Zarost didn’t want to guess what it had been.
Passover hadn’t looked so bad the last time he’d been here. The trading post had always been rough, that was the nature of dealing in such an outpost, but now the House of Rohm had a hungry feel to it. The current management were more interested in collecting money than generating it, Zarost guessed. They had overpowered the old traders and were failing to succeed at their new profession, because they were really just thieves. They had strangled trade through their greed, and the fewer the traders who came here, the poorer their information would be, and so the poorer their maps. The Passover trading post was doomed.
All things changed, Zarost noted, even in the places which had been spared the direct touch of Chaos. He approached the seated mercenary.
“Welcome to Passover, friend,” the mercenary said without rising or smiling. His accent was thick and grating, not true Korinese—a Lakelander then. “I am Drakk, and everything you see here is mine. I will trade nothing except for gold.”
Second Sight: Second Tale of the Lifesong Page 32
