by Julia Gray
'What does it mean?'
'It's the old name for the Cursed Islands. You know, the ones that move.'
Olandis stared at Aylen in astonishment.
'He can't have come from there,' he said eventually.
'That's insane!'
*
When morning came and Aylen roused Olandis to begin the preparations for their journey home, their patient appeared to be sleeping peacefully. His skin tone was healthier and - with his eyes closed - he looked normal enough, or at least as normal as anyone with his disabilities could look. The brothers'
earlier speculation had made them both wary and intrigued. The people of Macul had long believed that the Cursed Islands were either unpopulated or — if it was possible for anyone to survive in such unnatural circumstances — then the islanders must either be madmen or live like wild beasts. It was obvious that no true civilization could exist in a land where you could not even be sure where you were from day to day, and where the entire country must be inherently unstable. If the stranger really did come from Vadanis, it might explain his outlandish appearance and his tendency to spout gibberish - but the notion still seemed very farfetched.
When they had done everything possible to break camp, short of dismantling the tent itself, the brothers looked in on their patient. He woke then, and seemed a httle more alert than before. He drank eagerly once more, and was even able to eat a small amount of mashed fish, although swallowing was obviously very difficult and made him wince with the pain. Neither Aylen nor Olandis was able to look him in the eye for long - which seemed to puzzle or disappoint him -
but when they tried to talk to him he responded more readily than before.
'Can you speak?' Aylen asked.
The boy's reply was incomprehensible, but his voice, while still hoarse and little more than a whisper, was at least working rather better now. As he spoke he glanced
back and forth between his two saviours, as if hoping for some reaction.
'That's not the wanderers' tongue,' Olandis observed. 'No, it isn't,' Aylen agreed. 'So he really is a foreigner.' Macul was a vast country, and the brothers had never met anyone from beyond its borders. 'Either that or he's crazy.' 'I don't think so. He's trying to talk to us.' At this, as if to prove the point, the stranger spoke again. Unfortunately, what he said was just as unintelligible as his earlier efforts.
'This is hopeless,' Olandis grumbled.
'Not necessarily,' Aylen replied. Turning back to the castaway, he pointed to his own chest and said clearly, 'Aylen Mirana.'
'What are you doing?' Olandis whispered.
'We've got to start somewhere. Might as well be with our names.' He touched his chest again and repeated his name, then pointed to his brother and said,
'Olandis Mirana.' After that he gestured to the boy and raised his eyebrows in query.
The stranger hesitated, then mimicked the other's action and pointed to himself.
'Terrel.' It came out as a harsh grating sound.
'What did he say?' Olandis asked.
'Sounded like "Terel".'
'Is that his name?'
'I'm not sure. It could be, or it could just mean he's got a pain in his chest.'
'Oh, great. This is getting us nowhere.'
'"Terel" means "moonlight" in the wanderers' tongue, doesn't it?' Aylen asked thoughtfully.
'Don't ask me.'
'Farazin would know.'
'Perhaps he's named after the light in his eyes,' Olandis suggested.
The subject of the speculation merely looked from one to the other, his face a picture of incomprehension.
Terrel lay back in the cramped space in the bows of the canoe, and tried to make sense of this latest turn of events. So much had changed since he'd left the haven, but his present predicament left him more confused than ever before. Knowing that he must have been very close to death, he was immensely grateful to his saviours. Their fresh water and food - even though the tiny portion of fish he'd managed was sitting heavily in his abused stomach - had revived his spirits as well as his body. However, he was still very weak and, although he now felt as though he was going to survive, his increased awareness made the other unknowns of his current position all the more alarming. He felt lost and without hope. Even when he was awake - he still slipped in and out of consciousness - he had no idea where he was. In his more lucid moments, he was sure there could be nowhere like this on Vadanis. That meant the horror of his exile, which he had hoped was only a nightmare, was all too real. The fact that he was unable to communicate with the men who had rescued him was frustrating, and confirmed that he was in a foreign country. A barbarian country. And if that were true, then the land to either side of the river they were travelling along did not move. It stayed where it was, stagnant and prey to untold evils.
It was true that his new companions had not behaved like barbarians, but he had no way of telling where they were taking him, or what plans they had for him when they reached their destination. When they had helped him into the canoe that morning he had gone reluctantly, but had been unable to resist.
Going out on to the water again had set all sorts of horrors loose in his head, but it soon became clear that the two men had no intention of heading out to sea. Instead they were travelling inland, against the flow of the wide river, which ran between clusters of extraordinarily steep-sided, conical hills. The hills reminded Terrel of the 'animals' he had encountered earlier, but these were much larger and the vegetation that clung to their slopes and summits was much more verdant. With a cloudless blue sky giving the calm surface of the water an almost metallic sheen, it was a breathtaking, beautiful landscape — but for Terrel it was a friendless, alien realm.
Everything he had ever loved or cared about was immeasurably far away. The idea that he might ever be able to return to the Floating Islands seemed ridiculous, but that was what he had sworn to do, and somehow he had to try to get back. And unless he made a start by learning something of the land he was now entering, his quest would be over before it began.
He glanced up at the young man whose boat he shared, and saw him look away after a few moments. Terrel was aware that his rescuers were unnerved by his eyes, but he was used to that. Before he'd been taught to use the glamour to disguise them, most people had reacted in a similar way to his 'enchanter's eyes'. Using the glamour now was impossible; his mind was incapable of summoning the necessary resolve and belief. Until that moment it hadn't even occurred to him to try, and at this
stage it would have been pointless. They had seen the true nature of his eyes, and having them change to blue now would only make matters worse. As a result Terrel resorted to an earlier stratagem that had seemed to lessen their impact, and half closed his lids. Squinting like that did him little good, but it made it easier for others to ignore the strange nature of his irises.
Terrel's earlier 'conversations' had produced almost nothing of use. A few words here and there had seemed vaguely familiar, but he had been unable to grasp their meaning. The one possible step forward had been their exchange of names. At least that was what Terrel supposed it to have been. At the time he'd had to think before remembering his own name, and those of his rescuers had seemed very complicated. Even so, it was the best chance he had of beginning another dialogue. If he was ever to learn anything, he had to start somewhere. Terrel cleared his throat.
'Aylemirana?'
Aylen's eyes widened in surprise and Olandis, who was paddling steadily alongside, glanced at the stranger.
'Yes? That's me.'
Although their patient's response was meaningless, it was at least clear that he was trying to communicate with them. Once again Aylen thought that one or two words seemed familiar, but he could make no overall sense of it.
'I'm sorry,' he said, shaking his head. 'I don't understand.'
The stranger's disappointment was obvious, and he fell silent for a while.
Then his expression changed, and it
seemed that
another idea had occurred to him. His next question consisted of a single word - one the brothers did
recognize.
'Macul?' As he spoke, he jerked his good hand from side to side, presumably indicating the hills on either shore.
Aylen nodded vigorously.
'Macul. Yes. Macul.' He pointed with his paddle to emphasize his agreement.
'At least he knows where he is,' Olandis commented. 'Seems like it,' Aylen replied. Then, suddenly inspired, he switched his attention back to the boy.
'You. Are you from Vadanis? Va-dan-is?'
His passenger looked up as if the word was indeed familiar, but his expression was unreadable. He tried to reply, only for his tongue to betray him and his voice to creak into silence. A drop of blood ran from the corner of his ravaged mouth and, as his eyes closed again, his head lolled back.
'The sooner we get home the better,' Olandis said.
When Terrel next emerged from the inexplicable images of his still feverish dreams, he found that the canoes were navigating a much smaller river, with both men having to labour to drive their heavily laden craft against the stream. The land about them was less spectacular now, the slopes more manageable and the greenery not so lush. Fleeting memories disturbed him when he tried to move his tongue and found it parched and swollen once more. He wanted to ask for water, but remembered his last attempt at speech and decided not to try again just yet. He also recalled their most recent attempts at conversation, and the memory made him feel very uneasy. Confirmation that he was indeed in the barbarian land of Macul had come as no real surprise, but dread had risen within him nonetheless. On top of that, his companion's reference to Vadanis had confused and troubled him. What did they know? Were they trying to tell him something?
His rescuers were talking to each other now and, judging from the tone of their voices, they seemed to be relieved about something. Perhaps they were nearing their destination.
With some considerable effort, Terrel twisted round to look ahead. What he saw took his breath away and made him wonder anew about his fate.
Dwarfing everything around it, and with its colour contrasting starkly with its surroundings, the black mountain rose above him like a monster trying to swallow the sky.
Chapter Four
A woman's face drifted out of the mist that seemed to surround Terrel permanently now. He recognized her as one of several people who came to look at him from time to time. He associated her with kindness, with the comfort of a cool damp cloth wiped over his face, or food offered on a crude wooden spoon. The thought of food made bile rise in his throat, but he fought against that, knowing he must eat if he was ever to escape the mist. 'Meha va'ac aloua, Terel?'
She had a gentle voice. She did not shout or grow angry when he could not answer, like some of the others. Her smile, whenever he gave any response, was a reward he sought. But her question was incomprehensible, and it took him a few moments to realize that she had used his name — which sounded strange in her unfamiliar accent. When he did, it made him want to remember hers. Even his recent memories were blurred now and, although he was certain that he knew what she was called, it was a struggle to bring her name to mind. He had heard others talking to her . . . What was it? Her name . . .
His eventual success felt like a triumph.
'Ys-a-tel,' he whispered, stumbling over the alien syllables.
The smile that replaced her concerned expression lit up her face. She said something that he did not understand, then held up a small wooden cup so that he could see it.
'Aloua?'
Since Terrel had been in the village, he had learnt a few words of his hosts'
language, almost without realizing it. 'Aloua' meant water, and he tried to nod to indicate that he would like some. He had no idea how long he had been lying in the hut. It sometimes seemed as though he had only just arrived; at other times he seemed to have been there for ever. But no matter how long it had been, he was almost always thirsty, even now.
For all his efforts his head hardly moved, but Ysatel had obviously seen enough to know what he wanted. She held the cup to his lips and tipped it back and forth, allowing him to take a small mouthful and then swallow several times, rather than gulping it down. The water was brown in colour, and its oddly metallic taste had made Terrel gag at first, but he was used to it now, and grateful for the way it revived his spirits each time he drank.
After he'd finished a second cupful, Ysatel offered him some soup, and he forced himself to accept a few mouth-fuls before he had to stop. His stomach had rebelled too many times to allow him to continue. The food he'd been riven had been mostly plain fare, but to his ravaged senses it often tasted and smelled very strange. Even so, he was
in no position to complain. Such nourishment was keeping him alive, and the fact that on several occasions he had been unable to keep his meals down had made him feel ashamed of his ungrateful stomach, as well as being a setback to whatever chance he had of recovering from his illness.
Ysatel looked disappointed when he refused to eat any more, but knew better than to try to force food upon him. She left him - after wiping his face and saying a few words that he did not understand but whose tone was comforting -
and Terrel lay still, fighting off the approach of nausea by concentrating on the things he could see and hear.
His world had shrunk to this one room. It was a dark place, with the only light coming from the doorway of the adjoining room during the day or from a sparingly used candle at dusk. The air smelled permanently of damp wood and earth, and it was cold most of the time now that winter had arrived. During the long night the hut's larger room was quite crowded, with several people sleeping there, but in the hours of daylight it was often quiet and empty -
although someone usually came to check on him at regular intervals.
At that moment, as far as he could tell, Ysatel was the only other person there, and - judging by the odours of wood smoke and cooking that drifted in through the door — she was preparing a meal for some of the others. Terrel could not see her, but was able to listen to her movements; to the clank of a ladle against the sides of a metal cauldron and the crackle of the fire. At the same time he recognized the sound of running water coming from outside, something that was always there, a constant backdrop to life in the village.
In the distance he could hear dogs barking and men's voices calling to one another - and this brought other shadowy memories floating to the surface of his mind.
Since his arrival Terrel had occasionally been carried outside the hut, and his brief glimpses of the village had revealed a squalid shantytown of ramshackle buildings, clinging to the lowest slopes of the great black mountain. Above the huts, the river that ran down from the intimidating peak split into many small branches - cascading over the bare rocks as dark foam and dancing in hundreds of small pools. The water was so full of silt that where it was relatively still it appeared almost black. The river seemed to be the centre of a good deal of activity, and the houses were built mostly to either side of the extended waterfall, though a few actually stood in between the various streams. From his brief observations Terrel could not understand what the villagers did, nor why they had chosen to live in such an apparently inhospitable location. It was a place of poverty, of dirt and danger, where life evidently held few pleasures and no luxuries. The bare room in which he lay was testament to that. And yet he had been taken in and cared for. A foreigner, whose appearance could hardly have been reassuring and who could not even speak their language, had been rescued and brought to their home. He had been fed, bathed -and even clothed. At some unknown point Terrel's own garments had been replaced by a simple shift of a coarse grey material. His only other possessions - his boots and Muzeni's clay pipe — lay beside the narrow pallet where he now rested. He was at the mercy of strangers, helplessly reliant on their charity and compassion, and needing their help for even the most basic tasks. It could have been humiliating, but for the most part Terrel simply
felt grateful. He knew he must be a considerable burden to Ysatel and her family, and he couldn't work out why they were being so good to him. The contrast between their treatment of him -
especially as they had seen the true nature of his eyes - and that of the people of his own homeland, most of whom had reacted with horror or enmity, was as mystifying as it was welcome.
The light outside the hut was beginning to fade now and, grateful for the fact that his stomach seemed to have settled, Terrel allowed himself to drift back into sleep.
Ysatel looked up from her cooking, and smiled fondly when she saw her husband walking towards her. She had been Kerin's wife for almost five years now, but his daily return to their home still had the power to raise in her a mixture of desire, pride and protectiveness that sometimes threatened to overwhelm her. He was an almost legendary figure among the inhabitants of Fenduca, a village 'elder' even though he was little more than forty years old, and Ysatel had been in love with him for as long as she could remember. She also knew that although he loved her dearly, she could never entirely overcome the memories of Aryel, his first wife and the mother of his sons. The fact that Aryel had been dead for twelve years had allowed Kerin's feelings of grief and guilt to fade from view, but they were still there, hidden deep. Ysatel knew she could never erase the past - nor would she want to - but she also knew that she brought Kerin great happiness.
Her pleasure at the approach of her husband was diminished slightly when she recognized the man who walked stiffly at his side. Farazin Lanta was the village sky-watcher, their interpreter of dreams, and as such he was held in awe by many, and commanded the respect of his fellow elders. To her shame, Ysatel often found him both pompous and dull, and on this occasion she knew that his presence would mean another long and pointless discussion about the strange boy who now lay in their house, dreaming his even stranger dreams. His arrival in the village had caused much consternation, and the debate over whether he was a sharakan or a sorcerer - or whether any foreigner could be a sharakan - had raged for some rime. Interest was waning now that he'd been there for almost a short month, and he had received few visitors during the last day or two. The exception was Farazin who, naturally enough, was the person most people looked to to solve the mystery and decide the boy's fate.
