by Greg Keyes
Though everyone else trotted, she urged Dark into a gallop, stirring a small storm of leaves in the obscure light. The others watched her go, perhaps amused; she did not care. She wanted to run, to feel hooves pound in time with her heart. Tree branches whipped at her as the trail narrowed and steepened, but Dark was surefooted. Whooping, suddenly, she rounded a turn that plunged her down along a hillside—
And nearly collided with another rider. The horses shuddered to a halt as the other person—one of Sheldu’s outriders—shot her a look that contained both anger and fear. She opened her mouth to apologize, but he interrupted.
“Mang,” he gasped. “We can’t go that way.”
“What?”
“In the valley,” he insisted, waving his arms. “A whole army.” He frowned at her and then urged his mount past, disappearing up the slope.
Hezhi hesitated, her reckless courage evaporating—but not so fast as to take curiosity with it. The trail bent in a single sharp curve ahead, and through the trees bordering the trail she could see the distant slopes of another valley, far below. She coaxed Dark around that curve—hoping for just a glance of the army the outrider spoke of.
Beyond, the trees opened, and she faced down a valley furrowed so perfectly it might have been cut with a giant plow. On her right was only open air. To her left, the trail became no more than a track reluctantly clinging to the nearly sheer valley wall. So steep and narrow it was, she could hardly imagine a horse walking it without tumbling off; there were no trees on the precipitous slope to break such a fall before reaching the lower valley where the grade lessened and trees grew. Nevertheless, a group of Sheldu’s men stood, dismounted, farther down the trail, and far below them another knot of men and horses struggled up the track. Below them, through the gaps in spruce and birch, sunlight blazed on steel in a thousand places, as if a swarm of metallic ants were searching the narrow valley for food.
But they were not ants; they were men and horses: Mang.
Yes, it was time to return to the group. She wondered how long it would take the army to climb the trail, and if the riders already coming up the slope were friend or foe. They were dark, like Mang, but even with her god-enhanced sight they were difficult to make out, though one seemed familiar.
That was when her name reached her ears, borne by wind, funneled up to her by the valley walls.
“Hezhi!” Very faintly, but she recognized the voice. And then it came again. Gaping, she turned Dark back toward the approaching army.
XXXIII
The Steepening Trail
Ghe’s fingers tightened around his throat, and Ghan felt that his eyes were about to pop from his skull. Fighting for the merest sip of breath, he scarcely had leisure to understand that all around him, men were dying, throwing themselves between Moss and the demons Ghe had summoned from his veins. Ghan wondered, inanely, if the men could really fight and die in such grim silence, or if it was the roaring of blood in his ears that kept him from hearing them.
He clawed at the talons biting into his windpipe, but he might as well have pried at steel bolts set in marble.
“Now, what lie were you about to tell me, old man?” the ghoul snapped at him. “Why were you calling me a fool? Or shall I just find out by opening you up and peering inside?”
Ghan answered him the only way he could: by beating feebly against his attacker’s chest. Ghe looked puzzled for an instant and then roughly pushed him back. Blood and breath roared back into his head, and he fell, ears full of ocean sound.
He probably had only instants, but his throat was still closed up. Ghe had paused to examine his self-inflicted wound, the one the grass-bears had sprung from; it had stopped bleeding.
“I remember now,” Ghe told him, eyes suddenly mild.
Ghan grunted; it was the best he could do.
“When I died. Hezhi’s mouth was bleeding, and her blood was turning into something.” He settled his feet onto the ground. “Blood, you see, gives spirit shape. Did you know the stream-demon I took in? She had Human form because a Human girl bled to death in her. And my blood is so many things now.”
“She’s driven you mad,” Ghan shouted urgently. “Qwen Shen has you on a rope, like a dog, Ghe. Like a mongrel cur from Southtown.”
“Shut up, old man,” Ghe gritted. “No more lies from you.”
“It’s true. Did you know you call Hezhi’s name when you sleep with Qwen Shen? She owns you, bends your soul to her devices.”
Snake-quick, Ghe was there, slapping him with an open palm. The earth rippled like a sheet waving in the wind. Another slap, and Ghan saw only night.
When he awoke, Ghe was daubing his mouth with a wet rag. He spluttered, raising his arms reflexively to defend himself. Ghe shook his head, a silent no that served only to deepen Ghan’s confusion.
Moss stood behind Ghe. He looked weary, and one arm hung in a sling.
“What?”
Ghe shrugged. “I nearly killed you. That would have been a mistake. Like the River, I have trouble seeing myself; I need others, outside of me, to watch me. How do you feel?”
“Confused. I thought you and Moss were fighting to the death.”
“We were,” Moss interposed. “To my death, very certainly. You saved me, Ghan, gave me the information I was missing. I wish you had told me earlier about Qwen Shen’s hold on Ghe. If I had known a day ago, many of my warriors would still be alive. It is fortunate for us both that you blurted it out at last.”
“I trust none of you,” Ghan muttered. “I’ve made no secret of that. I keep what I know close. If you want it, he knows how to get it.” He jerked his chin defiantly at Ghe.
The ghoul shook his head. “No. Your knowledge would have been bound up inside of me with everything else, if I had taken you in before. I remember now why I wanted you on this expedition alive: because even hostile to me, you are more useful as you are.” His eyes narrowed. “But I will have no more betrayal. You have balanced the old debt; do not incur new ones.”
“I still don’t understand what happened.”
Moss smiled faintly. “I showed him his—what did you call it? Leash. I showed him the trap Qwen Shen had laid for him. Once I knew it was there, it was simple enough to see and reveal.” He rubbed his hurt arm. “She is powerful, that one. Dangerous.”
“What has become of her?” Ghan asked.
Ghe’s visage furrowed in wrath. “Gone, she and Bone Eel both. Gone I know not where. I will search for them.”
Ghan drew a deep breath. “Give me a moment to think,” he said. “Because I have something to tell you both. And some questions, as well.”
Now his senses could make out a cricket chirping half a league away, see a nut hanging on a tree at the same distance, scent the distinctive odor of a soul from even farther. Yet he found not the faintest trace of Qwen Shen or Bone Eel. It was as if they had wrapped a vanishing about themselves, the way powerful priests were able to—the way the temple itself did.
Out of sight of the camp, he raged. Trees splintered beneath his claws, small creatures of wood and field shriveled into skeletons in the tempest of his anger. He wanted to hurt himself, to pound his knuckles until bone cracked and blood covered him. He wanted desperately to feel pain once again, to purify himself through it.
But his skin no longer registered such sensations, and his flesh was no more susceptible to tearing than his bones to shattering. At last he gave up. He had failed the River, but that failure could still be redressed. Especially if he could puzzle out what Qwen Shen had been doing, and why. He remembered their lovemaking sessions now, and part of it at least was plain. She had labored to twist his fundamental desire to find Hezhi into some buried desire for her. She had not failed; he still trembled when he thought of her, her flesh, her eyes. But now he could remember the betrayals, the illusion of Hezhi in the throes of passion, the whispered conversations he forgot, the subtle suggestions that made such perfect sense from her lips…
Ah, when he found her it would b
e such a sweet thing. No passion she had ever brought him would be as great as unraveling the threads of her life, one by one, as he also unraveled the flesh and blood surrounding her.
He forced himself to think on the things she had made him forget; memories crowded for recognition, but he had no way of sorting them out. Moss could help him do that, and so could Ghan, though the latter would do so reluctantly. He rubbed his knuckles, again chagrined at their lack of soreness. They seemed odd, as he rubbed them, unyielding, and he realized with a start that some sort of bony plate was present beneath the skin. Puzzled, he continued to inspect his body. Broad sheets of hard substance lay beneath his chest, abdomen, thighs—a massive plate lay across his shoulders, and he realized that the skin there was actually colored by the armor pressing up from beneath, a dull aquatic gray, slightly blemished, like the back of a Rivercrab.
He didn’t know whether to be amused or horrified; removed from the protecting waters of the River, his body had begun growing a shell to defend itself. Qwen Shen had hidden that from him, too. Why had she done that?
To maintain in him the illusion that he was Human, of course. To keep him from the persuasions of Lady Death and his own common sense which told him that as much as he might believe himself to be Ghe, he was not.
He couldn’t think about that. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter, because he was someone, and he had the memories of a legion now to draw from, and he had his desire, his purpose, though Qwen Shen may have tainted it. And he would still have Hezhi, if not for himself, then at least for the River and for her, so that she might be the empress Moss told him she would be: Hezhi, empress of the world. And in such a world, ruled by the River and his children, might there not be some place for such as he?
Furious and bewildered, he stalked back to the rapidly breaking camp. The urge to fly ahead, alone, and confront his enemies by himself was nearly overwhelming. But he must listen to Moss now, who knew this world of magic and many gods better than he. Moss could throw his vision from him, see things far away—something Ghe found himself unable to do; when he tried, the spirit carrying his sight inevitably tried to escape, and he was usually forced to devour it entire. Moss controlled his familiars in a different way, by cajoling them, by bargaining with them; they came and went willingly. The shaman’s personal power was as nothing compared to Ghe’s, but it gave him some advantages. Moss knew where Hezhi and her captors were, knew that in a few days the paths of their forces would converge, at the base of the mountain looming west. Moss had urged Ghe to wait until then to strike. The waiting was hard, hard. Yet one thing he understood, now that Qwen Shen’s hold on him was released: he himself was a weapon, not a warrior. The River had made him thus, for it could not give him the wisdom or knowledge to know how he should strike or where. That was Moss’ task. Moss knew best how to wield him.
So perhaps—as a weapon—he spent too much time thinking. Thinking only served to confuse him, in the end.
He entered the camp, wondering what Ghan had to tell him.
Ghan stumbled to the stream, sought up it until the current was unsullied by the hooves of horses. Kneeling, he brought handfuls of the clear and incredibly cold liquid to his face, gingerly probed the cuts and bruises on his throat. So close, so close, and yet now he wondered if he had done the right thing. It might have been better if Moss were destroyed.
Well, he shouldn’t hold himself accountable for what he shrieked when Ghe had a grasp on him. Never in all of his years could he have ever imagined the forces at play, here beyond the simple and sterile world of the River. It was a terrifying world, and he feared for Hezhi. Everything seemed to hinge upon her, and a hinge swung too many times could weaken and break.
But, water take him, he was beginning to fear this unknown, unseen “Blackgod” even more than he feared Ghe. Here was a creature who had plotted and planned against this day for at least a thousand years. Such a creature might be resistant to attempts to alter its plans, and it would surely not take into account the feelings, desires, and wishes of a twelve-, no, thirteen-year-old girl. Whatever designs were laid down in the dark places of the world in the past millennia could not account specifically for Hezhi. One could not plan her—only a child like her. Hezhi had her own desires and motivations, and they might not coincide with what the gods wanted from her.
He closed his eyes, trying to imagine her face once more: chewing her lip, bent over an open book…
He opened his eyes and was startled to indeed see a woman’s reflection on the stream.
“If you cry out,” she whispered, “if you make the faintest of sounds, you will die. Do you understand that?”
Ghan turned to Qwen Shen and nodded. Bone Eel stood a small distance behind her. He looked grim.
“You will come back to the horses with me, and you will mount, and you will offer no resistance. If you do those things, you will not only live, but you will see your darling pupil again.”
Ghan shrugged, though he found it impossible to conceal his expression of anger. He followed her to the horses.
Surely Moss or Ghe would sense them somehow, find them.
But half a day later, as their horses lathered and panted beneath them, and they entered the bosom of the enormous forest, he was forced to admit that perhaps he was mistaken about that. About midday, Bone Eel called them to a walk, so that their mounts might not die beneath them.
“You are a fool,” Bone Eel told him casually.
Ghan turned sharply in his saddle. There was something in Bone Eel’s voice that sounded different, somehow.
“Am I?”
“You revealed us. We had the ghoul under our control, and you gave him the means to slip. You cannot imagine what you have released.”
“I think I can. I wonder if you can?”
Qwen Shen uttered a harsh laugh. “My husband has endured much,” she said. “He has pranced and played for your amusement, so that you would focus all of your attention upon me and never watch him. But do not be deceived. I have witchery enough, but—”
“Hush, beloved,” Bone Eel said, a cord of command strung through the words. “Giving this one knowledge is like giving an assassin weapons. Or perhaps like giving broken glass to a small child, I am not certain which. In any case, he needs to know little enough.”
“I know that you are servant of the Blackgod, who in Nhol we name the Ebon Priest,” Ghan snapped.
“Do you?” Bone Eel said easily. “Well, I must admit I would be sorely disappointed in you if you had not reasoned at least that much. Tell me more, prince of words and books.”
“The whole priesthood serves this Blackgod. But you are not priests. She is a woman and you are not castrated.”
“Right again. You are indeed clever, Master Ghan. Perhaps we were wrong in urging Ghe to swallow you up.”
“No,” Qwen Shen snapped. “We would still control the ghoul if we had persuaded that. What I endured from him, and then you render it all for naught!”
“Now, beloved,” Bone Eel sighed, wagging his finger at her. “You know that you enjoyed him well. Lie not to me.”
Qwen Shen opened her mouth to protest but when she met her husband’s gaze, a devilish look flashed upon her features. “Well, after all, my lord, on the River you were less than your usual self.”
“Hush, I said,” Bone Eel snapped, and this time Ghan caught real anger in his tone.
Qwen Shen obeyed, and the three rode in sullen silence for a bit.
“May I ask where we are going?” Ghan asked.
“You may, and I may even answer,” Bone Eel replied.
“Well?”
“We go to rendezvous with Hezhi and her retinue,” he answered.
“At best, you can only hope to reach them hours before Ghe and Moss. Less, if Ghe takes to the air. He can fly now, you know.”
“I know. Well, you can thank yourself for this mess. The balance was easily tipped in our favor when we had some control of Ghe. Now we have none, and the outcome of this shal
l be messy, at best. I seek the advice of someone wiser and more powerful than myself. Leaving Nhol, I left much of my power and wisdom behind,” Bone Eel confided.
“You seek Perkar, who rides with Hezhi?”
“Perkar? The barbarian dolt? No. Actually, you will be pleased to meet him in person, since you have thought so hard upon him.”
“The Blackgod?” Ghan grunted. “You’re telling me that Hezhi rides in the company of a god?”
“Perhaps, perhaps not. I can only barely see them. But I would bet my last copper soldier that he is near if he is not among them.” He shrugged. “Either way, in a day or so you will witness a battle such as this world has not seen in many, many ages. The rotten stump has been kicked, and termites pour out!” He laughed, genuinely and loudly, and the peals of it rang weirdly in the vast roof of the forest.
By the afternoon, he was no longer laughing. They entered a high, narrow valley and began hurrying their exhausted mounts up one slope of it. It was steep, very steep, and none of them was an accomplished horseman. Below, the lean shapes of mounted Mang began to appear, outriders or actual pursuit, it did not matter, for they clearly understood who rode ahead of them—whoops of discovery and triumph echoed through the vale. Perhaps Qwen Shen and Bone Eel had some priestly trick for muddling Ghe’s and Moss’ supernatural senses, but they could not fool the keen eyes of born hunters and warriors.
Cursing, Bone Eel brayed at his horse for more speed as Ghan noticed a strange hissing sound.
Something brushed through the forest to his right, moving much faster than a bird, and a black shaft appeared in a tree trunk.
“They’re shooting at us,” Ghan shouted.
“I know that, you fool,” Bone Eel snapped back.
“He is coming. He is near,” Qwen Shen added.
“I know that, too. The two of you darken your mouths and ride, if you’ve nothing useful to say.”
A few more arrows hissed by, but they must be at extreme range—or the Mang would not be missing them.
