by Hugh Cook
'Don't hurt me,' said Comedo. 'Oh don't hurt me.'
'Give me the ring,' said Miphon. 'Now!'
Comedo's fingers opened, and the ring fell to the stone floor. It rolled round and round in ever-diminishing circles, then fell, shivered and was still. Comedo backed away. Miphon stalked toward the ring, now ready to kill Comedo if he tried to grab it back. But Comedo kept retreating, with fear, despair and terror written on his torn and bloodstained face. Miphon scooped up the ring.
Comedo skipped back through the doorway and threw a lever hidden in the decorative carvings on the other side of the wall. A huge portcullis crashed down between him and Miphon, blocking the doorway. Miphon stood there unbelieving. Comedo had tricked him. Just like that. He had managed it so easily, so easily.
Comedo laughed.
'Now you'll grovel,' said Comedo. 'Now you'll grovel, now, down on your slime on your belly, because it's mine now. Mine!'
For a moment Miphon was dismayed, then he smiled. Of course! One turn of the ring would dissolve his body into mist, which would reassemble outside the bottle.
'You forget,' said Miphon. 'I've got the ring.' 'Have you now?' said Comedo. 'Have you now? Take a closer look, Mr Wizard. Take a closer look.' Miphon held up the ring to study it by the dim green
underseas light. But one ring looks much like another. He jammed it on a finger and turned it. Nothing happened.
'Do you want the magic ring?' said Comedo. 'Do you want it?'
Miphon walked to the portcullis. On the other side, Comedo grinned at him. Comedo opened his mouth, and fingered a ring out of the dark wet shadows within.
'You're my prisoner now,' said Comedo.
Miphon put his hands to the cold metal bars of the portcullis. He tried to shift it. He might as well have tried to move a mountain.
'You need me,' said Miphon, thinking quickly now. 'You could die from your injuries. They're starting to rot already. I can tell. You're going to die if you don't get my help.'
'Pox doctor!'
i tell you, if you don't get my help -"
Comedo shouted Miphon down, screamed at him, alternating rage with sarcasm, bitterness and spite. Miphon's bluff had failed. Turning, he walked away toward the staircase that led downwards deeper into the bottle.
'Run then,' said Comedo. 'Run then. You'll be back, when you get tired of drinking your own piss. You have to eat, you know. I'll feed you - once you've eaten. I've got you now. I'll have you licking out the inside of my nostrils before I'm finished with you.'
At the head of the stairs there was a hatch which Miphon could close and bolt after him. He did so, shutting out the sound of Comedo's ranting. Water, yes, he would need water: he was already thirsty, his throat dusty from that long slide down the scree slope.
But did he really dare venture downwards in search of it?
The stairs were dark. The steps, hollowed by many feet, reminded him of the bottle's great antiquity. It dated back to the Long War against the Swarms,
thousands of years before his birth. It might well contain dangers unknown to the age he had been born into.
He did not hesitate. He had no choice.
He descended the darkened stairs.
On reaching the bottom, Miphon found himself in a huge room bigger than any of the chambers above. The dim light from floor and walls showed him the room was empty.
Prince Comedo had been indulging in histrionics when he had sobbed that inside the bottle it was 'so jolty sway'. There was no trace of motion inside the bottle. The horizons were always the same. The fluids within the inner ear were as quiet and steady as the silent waters of a landlocked underground sea. The bottle was a self-contained world where the air felt dead and lifeless, as if nothing had stirred in it for centuries. The dull green glow from the walls, like the eye-vein patterns sprawled across the floor, had nothing to do with the world outside; the illumination was a property of the bottle itself, giving no hint of night or day. The temperature was constant, cool but not chill; neither sun nor frost in the world outside could alter it.
Miphon tried to remember his days in the sunlight -which already seemed a long time ago. He tried to remember the bottle swinging from Blackwood's belt. It widened from the neck for a third of its height, then for the next two-thirds it tapered very slightly to a flat base. Since the rooms were still getting larger, he could not have descended more than a third of the way to the bottom, if that.
Someone's tracks showed in the sparse scattering of dust on the floor. Miphon followed them to the next stairway and descended. He guessed Valarkin had left the tracks, as he doubted that Comedo would have cared to explore this bottle on his own - and the tracks had all been made by one person.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Miphon entered a
room where the walls were almost lost in the misty green distance. He followed dusty footprints till he was close enough to the walls to see the chairs, desks and shelves of books that were arrayed there. Valarkin, judging by the tracks, had lost his nerve and turned back at this point. And no wonder. The silence was enormous.
- This is what it will be like after the death-stone kills everything.
Miphon shivered, and went on.
Had this place been a library? A prison? A holding pen for hostages? Or a refuge in times of fire, flood, war? It could have been used for conferences, allowing wizards of different orders to meet, safe in the knowledge that none could use magic on the others. Perhaps Miphon might be able to find a ring that would let him leave the bottle.
Otherwise, the only way out was by a drop-hole, which was suicidal. Anything thrown into a drop-hole was subjected to tremendous acceleration; climbing down, one would be torn from the walls by that acceleration and spat out at the other end at a considerable velocity. Even if Miphon could, by a miracle, have got safely to a drop-hole's exit under the overhang of one of the wizard towers, he would have needed a second miracle to survive the difficult climb to the top of the battlements. If the fates denied him a double miracle, the drop-hole promised only a death in the flames of the fire-dyke.
So: no ring, no escape.
On a table was a chess game, which had been abandoned at a difficult stage. Miphon puzzled over it for a while, then placed a wizard aboard a dragon to be ready for flight or attack. He walked around the board to look at it from the other side. Now the counter to that move . ..
Miphon shook himself.
A Rovac warrior caught in this trap would have been 270
tearing the room apart to find some ring or key or tool or clue that would secure release. No Rovac warrior would have given up without - at least! - ransacking this vast room. Could a wizard do any less?
Part of the problem was that Miphon, like any wizard of Nin, had always had that comforting thought at the back of his mind: if the worst comes to the worst, if there is no other way, then I will begin the rites of recall. I will recall the powers too terrible for a human being to be trusted to live with: I will open the book of Nariq.
But here in the green bottle, his magic would not work. He had no more resources here than any mortal man. Nevertheless: he had the room to search. He began.
Much later, he found the ring, which lay on a page of an open book. He put it on the ring finger of his left hand, then twisted it experimentally. It was only as he twisted it that he noticed the red bottle that stood on a nearby bookshelf. The ring turned full circle and Miphon was sucked into the red bottle.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Fear is the mind-sharpener.
A shadow wheeled over rock and sand. The men scattered. They dived for cover, and lay still. They could hear the creak of wings labouring through the sky. The shadow lurched over the rocks, once, then again. The dragon was circling overhead. Then they heard it alight on a bluff overlooking the ground where they were hiding.
It was hot. Hot and quiet. Morgan Hearst lay in an anorexic shadow in the lee of a rock. The desire to look up almost overwhelmed him, but to move could be death. Inst
ead, he concentrated on his hand. He flexed the fingers: they were his own. But he saw the hand in all its strangeness, as though taking his first look at the paw of an alien species.
i've got cramp,' said Erhed, a young man who had the weakest brain of any of Comedo's soldiers.
'Shut up, Erhed,' said Hearst.
'But I've got cramp!'
'Shut up!' hissed Hearst.
i've got -'
Alish closed the distance in a convulsive leap. Smashed Erhed with a chunk of rock. Silenced him. Hearst lay still as death. Would that movement attract the dragon's attention? Would this be the end? He waited. And waited. And the dragon: did not swoop.
So Alish had saved them. Alish, hearing Erhed so close to panic, had acted. And Hearst had not: had been afraid to move, even though he had seen that Erhed was about to panic and run, bringing disaster to all of them.
In the Cold West, men had rightly called Hearst fearless: he did not remember being afraid in those days, not even at Enelorf when the troops of the Stormguard broke and ran in panic. Morgan Hearst, son of Avor the Hawk, had been bold to the point of recklessness, scorning fear and doubt.
However, when the chill of the Cold West had begun to get to his bones, Hearst had lost the absolute certainty which had previously characterised his every action. He remembered how they had been skirmishing outside the walls of Larbreth when the joints of his right arm had begun to seize up. He had wielded his sword left-handed while he made his escape. He had known fear then; and many times since.
And knew it now.
Where was the dragon? Was it still high on that bluff, or was it moving softfoot down to the killing ground where the men lay hiding? Could a dragon move softfoot? Was it playing a game with them, as a cat will play with a mouse? How long could the men lie there in the shadow of fear? Sooner or later one was sure to panic and run.
Hearst heard the dragon take to the air. The wings creaked. The shadow plunged overhead. Where was it headed? Was it gaining height, ready to dive down to attack them?
'It's gone,' said Alish, in a voice Hearst remembered from the Cold West: the voice of Bloodsword, He Who Walks, Our Lord Despair. 'On your feet,' said Alish. it's gone. Come on. Up! You, and you: carry Erhed. He's stunned.'
As the men slowly got to their feet, Hearst consulted with Garash.
i thought dragons only flew by night,' said Hearst.
'No law tells them to,' said Garash. 'They may choose otherwise here.'
'What do you suggest we do then?' said Hearst.
'There is nothing to do,' said Garash. 'Except hope.'
'What's this?' said Alish. 'Taking advice from wizards, are we?'
'There's nobody else to ask,' said Hearst.
'Then we can keep our own counsel,' said Alish.
'Many value the advice of wizards, manroot,' said Garash.
'When fear speaks to fear, courage sees no reason to listen,' said Alish. 'We march.'
* * *
The challenge came the next evening. The Rovac warriors had heard not so much as a rumour of trouble, but then, they had been busy - Alish scouting ahead for the easiest route, Hearst helping Garash and Blackwood over the more difficult parts of the trail, and Gorn bringing up the rear to make sure no stragglers lagged behind. Those who wished to conspire had been given all the opportunities they could have wished for.
The mutiny was planned and led by Atsimo Andranovory, an experienced, dangerous man. Born in Lorp, a poverty-stricken land on the west coast north of Estar, he had spent part of his early life as a fisherman in the Lesser Teeth, before joining the Orfus pirates. Boozing and brawling had destroyed any prospects he might have had there: after quarrelling with a pirate captain, he had been put ashore at Iglis, in Estar, and had put his sword at Prince Comedo's command.
In Castle Vaunting, Andranovory had never amounted to much - he had just been a drunken bully boy. Even after they had left the High Castle, the thought highest in his mind had been the proper care and rationing of the two skins of hard liquor which he had carried in his pack.
However, it was now a long time since Andranovory had put alcohol to his lips - or, for that matter, to any less conventional part of his anatomy - and he was clear-minded and ready to assert himself. He knew full
well that it would be easy enough to gain the Velvet River and retreat to the Harvest Plains in the south, whereas the journey north was taking them into danger, with every chance that winter would catch them on the desolate uplands of the Central Plateau.
Andranovory soon found he was not the only one who thought it was better to sing about heroes than to try to emulate them. After all, in this desolate wasteland there was no chance of any pillage, plunder or rape -unless, as Erhed said, one was to find a very young and tender dragon. All that was needed was the right moment to strike.
At the camp they made that evening, the right opportunity arose, for Elkor Alish unbuckled his sword to give him complete freedom of movement for a difficult climb up a cliff face to raid a bird's nest. Andranovory let him make the climb - he fancied an egg as much as anyone - but moved his men into position with a nod or a wink.
When Alish descended, he noticed nothing odd, for his concentration was devoted to treasuring down the half-dozen bird's eggs he was carrying in a string bag, gripping the draw-strings in his teeth.
When Alish jumped the last little bit to the ground, he found a half-circle of men confronting him, and Andranovory holding his sword-belt.
'Good evening,' said Andranovory.
And smiled.
As adrenalin armed him for action, Alish glanced around, noting men standing guard over Garash, Gorn and Hearst. How easily they had been taken! They must have been half-asleep. The wizard Garash, despite his power, was helpless when someone was holding a knife at his back - as Alish had proved during their first confrontation at Castle Vaunting.
Beside Hearst stood a man who held the battle-sword Hast, and was gloating over the firelight steel. Hearst gave Alish a little nod, and Alish, giving no answering
signal, waited just long enough for Andranovory to begin to speak.
'The boys and me,' said Andranovory, drawing the Melski blade, 'Have been thinking, and - '
Alish smashed the eggs into his face and butted him in the stomach. Then pushed him, sending him reeling back into the crowd. And Gorn and Hearst were moving, smashing fists and elbows into the nearest faces. Hearst tossed a weapon through the air. Alish grabbed for the hilt, snatched the sword from the air, and screamed:
'Ahyak Rovac!'
Gorn and Hearst, both now armed with weapons not their own, broke free from the mutineers and danced into position, moving with an effortless grace in which there was not the slightest hint of a swaggering boast or bluster - only the perfect economy of absolute professionalism.
'Three against forty,' said Alish. 'The odds are even!'
And some of the mutineers fell back, as if believing him. The more clear-sighted saw that Alish was simply making war on them with words, but, all the same, none wanted to be the first to die. And nobody, watching Our Lord Despair flanked by Gorn and Hearst, could for a moment have believed that those three warriors would surrender, whatever happened from now on.
Andranovory, pushed forward by the others, hesitated, then picked up the Melski blade which he had dropped when Alish had butted him.
Alish moved.
Light blurred through the air. Steel halted a fraction from Andranovory's throat. Then Alish withdrew the blade.
'What have you got to say to me now?' said Alish. Andranovory looked around. 'Come on, boys,' he said. Nobody moved.
'I think you'll find they're suddenly hard of hearing,' said Alish.
'Then it seems I must surrender to your ... justice!'
And with the last word, Andranovory swung at Alish, putting all his strength into the blow. The Melski sword slashed through the air.
Elkor Alish moved like a dancer. One hand gripped the hilt of Hast. The other slid along the f
lat of the blade so that his arms were widespread, bracing the sword. Andranovory's full-strength swing sent the Melski blade slamming into this barrier, cutting edge impacting with flat steel.
The Melski blade shattered.
And Elkor Alish was moving again, sidestepping, pirouetting, outflanking Andranovory with nimble steps which suggested that he could have made a spectacular career for himself as a dancing master in one of the courtly cities of the Cold West.
The mutineer, still holding the Melski sword with its jagged stiimp of blade, tried to turn to meet him. Alish tripped him expertly. Andranovory went sprawling. The battle-sword Hast sliced down - and sheared away part of his scalp.
Alish dug the point of the sword into the bloody piece of skin and hair, flicked it into the air and fielded it. The piece he had cut away was half the size of the palm of his hand. Andranovory lay on the ground, dazed, half-persuaded he was dead. Alish gave a small bow, and offered him the trophy, saying:
'Madam, you seem to have mislaid your wig.'
The joke allowed the tension in the air to dissipate with a roar of raucous laughter, leaving the chief mutineer hurt, bloody, humiliated, discredited - but alive.
