The walls that they passed glittered as if they were made from obsidian. The torchlight danced over the condensation-slicked stone, but it made no impression on Wist. He had to find Brathoir. Even the chill of the moist air only served to quicken his stride.
Before long Wist and Tyla found what they sought. The last group of Giants were different from the others they had come across. None of these Giants were armoured or armed. There were piles of organised weapons; armour stacked on litters; barrels of water and an array of rations.
And at the rear of all of them lay Brathoir. He lay on the ground, flanked by four smaller comrades, each of them held one of Brathoir's thrashing limbs. As they approached him, Wist wondered why he could not hear the injured Giant cry out or scream, but a few yards from Brathoir, Wist saw the staff gripped between his teeth. The Giant bit it with such force that it should have shattered.
Wist ran up to Brathoir's side. He lay beside the fire in the camp, but the Giant was too far in thrall of his pain to notice Wist's arrival. The ground shook as the Giant thrashed. Brathoir's torment sickened Wist. 'Help him,' he shouted into the face of one of the Giants who held a leg.
'We do all that we can,' he replied. 'Were we at home then perhaps we could do more, but I suspect not.' Wist heard the honesty in his words. He could also smell the suppuration of the Giant's crushed leg over the smoke from burning wood.
'Christ, it would be better to kill him than let him suffer this,'
'We do not harm our own.' The Giant stood aghast and his expression was mirrored on the faces all of the priests. 'If the World wills that he dies then it shall be so.'
Brathoir's mute scream failed to cover a sharp crack, which confirmed another break in his bones. This triggered a renewed frenzy of thrashing from the restrained Giant.
Wist stepped back and turned to Tyla. He held out his hand to the Lyrat, but said nothing. Tyla looked at Wist, and then glanced at the pathetic figure on the ground and in a simple fluid motion, he unsheathed his Katana and flipped it to present it, hilt first to Wist.
Wist grabbed it and held firm for a second. Then he nodded and Tyla released the blade. Shaking, Wist plunged the tip of the blade into the fire. The fire leapt in response to the touch of the metal, as if someone had poured pitch onto it. Startled by the fire's ferocity, the Giant holding the injured leg lost her grip, slipped and banged her head. The sickening crack that the leg made when it was moved brought Tyla to take the place of the unconscious Giant. The Lyrat used his strength and skill to hold the limb steady whilst causing the minimum of discomfort. Tyla fired a few orders at the others, which they obeyed, as if cowed by the Lyrat's ferocity.
Wist pulled the curved blade from the flames. It was coloured with the hues of hatred and revenge. The heat from the blade should have burned his fingers, melted the flesh from his digits, but he felt nothing apart from his outrage at the agony pulsing in Brathoir's destroyed leg. The leg was in bloody tatters.
The Giant that held Brathoir's right arm yelled at Wist as he approached, but a glance from Tyla silenced him.
'You must not do this,' muttered another of the Giants, but the words carried no authority.
Wist raised the Katana to strike and Brathoir bit through the wood, crushing it and sending pieces of wood and blood into the air.
The crimson blade paused for a heartbeat at the pinnacle of its arc. Tyla pivoted his weight, moving himself to the bottom of Brathoir's leg, but maintaining his hold.
As the Katana cut through the darkness, Tyla released the limb and span away, letting the blade bite into the bloody mess of Brathoir's leg. Brathoir howled and screamed in agony as acrid smoke plumed into the air. Wist fed the fire in the blade with his abhorrence of the wound and sword sliced through the limb with the slow, deliberate cut of a scalpel. Brathoir swore and then fell silent, rendered unconscious by the pain. Wist completed his stroke, severing Brathoir's wasted leg.
The Giant's released Brathoir now that they were redundant. They tried to rush Wist, but Tyla stopped them, putting all of them down without harm.
Wist looked up from the cauterised stump and glowered at the fallen Giant's. 'What would you have me do? Leave him to die in screaming fucking agony? Let the poison in his leg ruin his body?'
He turned to Tyla and tried to calm himself. 'Do something for him,' he said. The Lyrat had attended Aviti after Waren's attack outside of Mashesh.
The intensity in the Lyrat's eyes caused Wist to hold his breath, but then Tyla nodded, and his face changed. His impassive façade slipped back into place and he walked around the unconscious Brathoir, which caused the Giants to scatter from the Lyrat. A few other Giants came to see what had occurred, but they stayed at a distance.
Tyla came to a halt at Brathoir's head. As he had done when he had healed Aviti, Tyla held his hands over the Giant, keeping them an inch or two from making contact. Then he started to walk around Brathoir, keeping his hands over him.
Wist sat down a few yards from them, placing his back against the damp rock wall. It was far enough away from the stench of burned flesh to stop him gagging. He sat rigidly and forced himself to watch over Tyla.
The face of the woman came to him again in the darkness. It was a soft, beautiful face. He stared at the lines and shadows that it encompassed. Each line held a part of his past, and lurking in the depths of the shadows there was a truth he should confront. Then the darkness began to eat into the face, breaking those flawless arcs, interrupting the perfect planes. He watched in impotent silence as the blackness devoured the light.
-*-
The Giant Brathoir's curses and a tremor in the ground brought Wist awake. He swore and stood. Unaware of how long he had slept, and without the sun for reference, he could only guess. Tyla rested beside Brathoir. He stood as Wist rose.
Other Giants moved around the camp, packing, lifting, and readying themselves for departure. They all ignored Brathoir and the two intruders. Brathoir shouted again and a smaller Giant ran to him with a stone vessel containing a potent brew. As Wist moved away from the wall to stand beside Tyla, Brathoir launched the pot at the Giant who had brought it, sending him scurrying away.
'So you let him chop my leg off did you?' the Giant growled at Wist as he sat up. Tyla moved forward and presented Brathoir with the broken shaft of a spear.
'No,' said Wist. The immediacy that had gripped Wist was gone now. 'It … was me.'
'You?' The Giant let out a roar of laughter, which echoed along the cave, reverberating at each contact with the black stone walls. Brathoir grabbed the shaft of the broken spear and used it to pull himself upright. He glared at Tyla and the Lyrat raised an eyebrow and nodded.
The Giant stooped and picked up another length of wood, placing this one under an arm as a crutch. He shuffled on his remaining foot as he attempted to find his balance.
He felt the end of the stump. At the first touch of the blistered skin, his fingers recoiled. But he forced them back to assess the quality of the work or the damage done.
'If we were in Athadh you would be flayed for this,' said Brathoir. 'Battle wounds are not treated in the way we heal more … mundane injuries. The priests who worship The World would have it that they should be revered. Scrapes and cuts may be tended, but a blow accepted in war must remain to show our failing, our weakness; so that we may learn to be strong.'
Brathoir spat and gritted his teeth. He turned to Wist. 'I cannot understand your purpose, and do not pretend to comprehend what horrors lurk behind your eyes pale-skin, but I thank you for this dark deed, Dionach.' Then he tried to bow.
'We should move, if I can manage it. The priests will not move for an hour or so yet and they will not welcome my presence here. With luck, we may catch Oinoir before he goes.' Brathoir lurched forward so Wist and Tyla went with him. The Giant moved in uneven awkward jerks, but he picked up the pace as he went along.
Each time they passed a group of Giant's, disconcerted mutterings followed them. Brathoir spat whenever he heard them,
but he could spare no energy to reply.
Then his crutch fell out from under him, felling the Giant, who hit the stone floor of the chasm with a crack. Tyla and Wist rushed to his side, but the Giant rolled over onto his back and laughed through his gasps.
'I don't think we will catch Oinoir just now,' said Wist. Tyla balanced his torch against the wall and it provided enough light to take some water and food as they waited for Brathoir to recover. The end of this curving section of the massive tunnel was off somewhere in the darkness.
'I'm sorry,' Wist said to Brathoir. 'I…I had to do it. I could feel the poison in your leg. It felt as if it was desperate to feed on your heart. It felt avaricious.'
The Giant looked blankly at him. 'I shall only curse you for one thing. I appear to have lost my taste for drink.' Then he smiled. 'Strange days,' he concluded.
When Brathoir had regained his breath, they packed up and moved on. This time they passed no-one, and the pace they set was more moderate, which allowed them to keep going. It was so difficult to get an idea of time in this place. At one point, Wist felt as if they stood still, although they continued to walk. Nothing changed. The stone went on forever. The cavern widened and narrowed, but nothing impeded their movement.
Then they came to a section of broken, fragmented rock. The layers of strata jutted out at them, displaying scars and patches of light, rough stone amongst the dark. Sparkling fragments of blue shone in the darkness. At first, Wist thought it reflected their meagre torchlight, but as he touched one of the points, it responded to his touch, glowing brighter for an instant.
'Nikka would have been amazed by this,' he said aloud. Tyla glanced, but never replied.
As they continued the gradual descent, the patches of glowing blue stones grew more frequent and intense. When they were bright enough to see by, Tyla extinguished his brand and slipped it into the straps on his back.
'Uir-uisge,' said Brathoir. 'World's water' he indicated the glowing stones. 'Perhaps that will keep the priests off our back. I have never seen so much of it in one place.'
Brathoir went up to a place where it was concentrated on the wall. He pulled a fist-sized lump away from the wall, but the moment he did so, the light went out and it became nothing more than a blue-tinged rock. He dropped it and they went on their way. The colour of the shining stones deepened they went too. Their light azure was slowly transformed to an intense sapphire.
The path under their feet grew slick. Wist's breath began to form clouds as they walked and he pulled on a cloak to fight back the cold.
As they turned a sharp left bend, they entered a patch of near-total darkness. Tyla remained undaunted and began to walk forward, but Brathoir called for him to halt. He flexed his hands on his makeshift crutches. Wist welcomed the break, as he could not make out his own hands in front of his face.
So they stood in the gloom, whilst they let his eyes adjust. Wist wondered why Tyla hadn't reached for the torch, but then he noticed the faint blue glow from ahead. Accompanying it was a sound from the past; a sound that threatened his stability.
The shouts from down the cavern grew louder. These were not calls of pain and battle, but those of joy. And the chatter that reached them was enveloped in a cascade of splashing.
Tyla looked at Brathoir and then moved forward toward the light. The Giant gripped his crutches and did likewise. Wist held back for another couple of heartbeats, and then he too started walking.
Around a final bend, the light spilled from the mouth of a bigger cavern, the entrance to which put Wist in mind of a cathedral. The blackened stalactites that lined the mouth dripped water onto him, baptising him as he passed. Wist wiped his head and pushed the water from his eyes. When they were clear, he was greeted by an enormous body of water.
A lake spread out before him. From its bottom, a deep luminous blue light shone onto the broken, stalactite covered roof. Some of the younger Giants frolicked in the water, much to the disapproval of the others, crammed on to the makeshift shoreline.
A wave of memory overcame him then: the water, the beach, the laughter, the joy. He could banish it no longer.
It was a time of joy. A careless, endless, hopeful summer. And she was there, at the centre of it all - the face that had come to him in the night. And how he had loved her. He had poured all his faith into her and she had helped him to leave his past behind.
He came to his senses when Oinoir roared at Brathoir. It was a wild, extravagant cry. He looked up to see the Giants embracing. Perhaps there would be recriminations later, questions to be answered, but they could wait.
Tyla looked out at the surface of the water that moved and broke on the boulders that made up the shore. Wist went to stand with him, leaving the Giants to talk. After a second, the Lyrat removed his Katana and dipped it into the water. Then he dried it and took out a whetstone. The blade was scorched and blackened, but as the Lyrat sharpened the edge, a glimmer of silver returned to it.
'You did well,' said Tyla returning the blade to its sheath. Then he turned away and went to lay out the bed-rolls.
Once the young Giants tired of their sport, the camp settled down until the priests arrived. Wist expected trouble, but the devout Giants were too overwhelmed by the lake, by the presence of so much of the vaunted World's water stones to bother about one injured Giant. They set up camp as far as they could from the warriors and the supply wagons, and then they began to sing. Wist guessed it was a prayer or praise to some God. The massive chamber amplified the noise, giving the impression of hundreds of worshippers at a service.
They chased one of the young Giants from the water, claiming ownership, telling him it was a sacred place and should be treated with reverence. Then the cavern fell silent and Wist closed his eyes once more.
-*-
He found himself on a hill. He called out but his voice was lost in the wind. He could see for miles up here, above the trees, above the hills, above all his troubles.
A sudden gust from below blew up a storm of leaves and then the uniform dark green carpet was peppered with russet, amber and ochre. The trees continued to discard their plumage as the wind circled around him. There was a bite in the air now, a malevolent undertone that he had failed to notice at first. It nipped at skin, seeking a way in, seeking a way to defeat him.
He looked at himself and realised he was naked. Why was he standing on a hill in the cold without clothes? Before he could think of an answer, the rain came to join the wind in its assault.
Rather than the rain beating down the swirling leaves, it whipped them up into a frenzy and the assault began in earnest.
He was in the centre of a hurricane now. The leaves lost their shape and colour in the rain. They began to deform and merge. There was no warmth left in them, only darkness and loss.
Lightning sparked within him and it struck out at the writhing mass of black shapes that surrounded him. The first speck of darkness that his azure bolt kissed detonated soundlessly, scattering countless fragments. But rather than fade away, the ebony motes multiplied.
Again and again he fired his impotent power at the closing night, but then it altered. The righteous blue of his passion mutated to crimson and it fed the darkness.
Where was the Sun? It must be there. He had seen the trees swaying in the autumnal light before this cloying emptiness had attacked him. Where was it now?
Then he was alone. Alone in the dark with his heartbeat for company. It beat on, in defiance of the emptiness. Forever it beat, refusing to accept the simple fact of his death, in his own time and place.
Why couldn't it let him be?
Then it was joined. A trickle of laughter split the night. It was high-pitched laughter, indistinct at first but it grew in ferocity. It neither mocked him nor pitied him. It was indifferent to him. And it was the source that shocked him back to life, for it was not his brother's laugh, but that of a woman.
-*-
Wist woke and the memory of his dream faded. When he looked up, he saw that h
alf of the Giants had already moved off, heading around the lake and further down into the caverns. Although most of the other Giants were ready to move, the priests would not be leaving.
He rose and looked at the water. Without anything to disturb the surface, its blue light made the spikes on the roof look like massive fangs. Without the sounds of the Giants playing or the mournful songs of the priests, the deadened footfalls of the marching troops trampled his hope.
Leagues above them the Ghria Duh burned. He could feel it there, through the miles of rock, sucking life from the world.
Tyla who stood waiting so Wist shook himself and prepared to move. Brathoir and Oinoir joined them. Brathoir's hands were bandaged now because of his crutches. His stump was attached to a makeshift wooden leg, made from parts of a cart, with leather and wool at the join to improve the fit. Wist reckoned that it must be the size of a tree.
'I am in your debt once more Wist,' said Oinoir, 'though you are fortunate that the holy ones have found something to entertain themselves. Durach, our King, is keen on them, these Priests. But I have little time for worship of the World, although they are quite the wonder, these caves. For all we have mined this area for generations we had no idea that this place existed.' Brathoir nodded and together they made their way along to the end of the cave.
The ground underfoot was softer than the previous day. The stone was hidden beneath layers of soft damp dirt, which began to churn into mud with the passage of so many heavy feet. Wist looked back as they exited the chamber, and with a pang of regret, he left the underground lake, and his memories behind.
Oinoir chatted to Brathoir as they moved. The wooden leg allowed Brathoir to increase his pace and to use a single crutch, so they managed to keep their place in the line. These tunnels were dark with no patches of the glowing blue stones that had lead them to and from the lake. It forced Oinoir, and many others, to carry torches to light the way. Their harsh light cast a pall over the company.
The Redemption of Wist Boxed Set: Books 1 - 3: The complete collection Page 45
