Geomancer twoe-1

by Ian Irvine

  Nish ran into Irisis in the corridor in the middle of the night and asked her what had happened. ‘I know nothing about it,’ she said, and walked away.

  Nish was more worried than ever. She must have murdered the man. Nish was in way over his head and sinking fast.

  Querist Fyn-Mah had still not appeared when Gi-Had and Nish set out at dawn. Presumably she had also been delayed by the weather. The snow had stopped but the wind was scouring snow off the path as they hurried down the mountain.

  They arrived in Tiksi with red, wind-blasted faces, reaching the breeding factory at midday. The door guard sneered when he caught sight of Nish, who trembled lest the man reveal the details of his previous visit. In Matron’s office they received a most unpleasant surprise. Tiaan had escaped in the night.

  Gi-Had let out a monumental groan and gripped his head in gnarled hands, as if trying to squeeze the pain out of it. ‘Where has she gone?’

  ‘How in the blazes should I know?’ Matron replied. ‘I wish I’d never set eyes on the wretch. The damage she’s done to our reputation won’t be undone in a hurry. I’ve a good mind to ask for the indenture money back, after the damaged goods you’ve sold me.’

  ‘You knew what you were buying!’ he cried, unwilling to let her get the better of him.

  ‘You said she was incurably mad!’

  ‘That was the advice my healers gave me,’ Gi-Had said stiffly.

  ‘She was sane and cunning when she woke up.’

  ‘In which case you should have paid more for her, not less.’ Nonetheless Gi-Had was delighted to hear that Tiaan had recovered. ‘Where is she now?’

  ‘No one knows. She led the entire household a dance for hours, then escaped.’

  ‘The factory will buy her indenture back,’ Gi-Had said, ‘as soon as she’s found.’

  ‘Now just wait a minute …’ she began.

  ‘There’ll be a bonus in it. And, I should warn you …’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, alerted by his smouldering temper.

  ‘This comes at the orders of Jal-Nish Hlar, the perquisitor.’

  ‘Of course we’ll do everything in our power to cooperate,’ she said quickly.

  ‘Did she have any visitors?’

  ‘Only a decrepit old miner. Should never have let him in the place.’

  They questioned Tiaan’s mother too, but all Marnie could do was complain – about the discomfort, the ingratitude of her daughter, but most of all that her client would not be coming. Next they went to the querist’s house but Fyn-Mah had left Tiksi some days back. By the time they reached the fire-scarred city gate they were no better informed as to where Tiaan might have fled.

  ‘She could not have gone far,’ said Nish, ‘with no money, clothes or friends.’

  ‘Perhaps to the coast,’ Gi-Had mused. ‘She has half-brothers and sisters down there.’

  At the gate they had their first piece of useful news, for among the guards was the fellow Tiaan had escaped from.

  ‘Damn near burned the guardhouse down.’ He indicated the charred timbers. ‘And then she fixed the bar so it’d fall closed behind her. I’d never have known, had I not seen it fall.’

  Nish was about to make a sarcastic remark about the intelligence of guards. He’d had an awful day and his back was in agony. But he caught Gi-Had’s eye on him and, mindful of the trouble he was in, held his tongue.

  ‘Do you have any idea which way she went?’ he asked.

  ‘Straight up the road.’ The guard pointed.

  ‘She might have doubled back,’ Gi-Had said.

  ‘I followed her tracks as soon as it became light,’ said the guard. ‘She was going up the path to the manufactory. It’s a wonder you didn’t run into her this morning.’

  ‘She must have heard us coming.’ Gi-Had gave the man a coin for his trouble.

  About an hour later, rounding a hairpin bend in light snow, they came upon two porters and a guard, plodding along, heads down, in a state of exhaustion.

  ‘Hoy!’ Gi-Had roared.

  Their heads jerked up. The guard broke and ran but the others called him back. Gi-Had jogged up to them, stepping high through the snow. Nish hurried after him, which hurt his back cruelly.

  The woman cried out, ‘It’s Overseer Gi-Had. Gods be praised. Surr, surr, we’ve been attacked by lyrinx!’

  She staggered and nearly fell. Gi-Had held her up. ‘Porter Ell-Lin, is it not?’

  ‘That’s right, surr! Kind of you to remember.’ Ell-Lin touched one shoulder and then the other, a sign of respect. She was a large, stocky woman with big shoulders and a thick neck. Jet-black hair had been cropped short around a broad, weatherbeaten but not unhandsome face. Her slanted black eyes were narrowed to slits.

  ‘Tell us about the attack, Ell-Lin. You know Artificer Cryl-Nish, of course!’

  ‘I saw him at the whipping.’ She averted her gaze. Nish flushed nonetheless. ‘We were coming down Ghyllies Pinch, ten of us and the new clanker. We’d left late because of a cracked front strut. It was the last hour of the morning. As we rounded the corner a boulder rolled down the hill and smashed the clanker in. The beasts came out of the rocks; three, there were. Everyone else is dead. Were we not ahead they’d have got us too.’ She shuddered at the memory. ‘Lyrinx were eating Wal, and poor ole Yiddie …’ She put her head in her hands. ‘It ain’t right, is it! Eating folk!’

  ‘What about the clanker?’ said Gi-Had. ‘Could it not …?’

  ‘It was destroyed, surr.’

  ‘What, completely?’

  ‘The back was crushed, and the people inside. Beasts got the other soldiers too. They fought bravely but it was useless. We dropped our loads and ran.’

  ‘Cowards!’ sneered Nish, forgetting himself.

  ‘Shut up, boy!’ Gi-Had roared. ‘Or you’ll join them. You did well, Ell-Lin. The goods we can replace, if they took them, but porters are vital to the war. Which way did they come?’

  ‘Down the mountain,’ muttered the man who had tried to run away.

  ‘And you didn’t see which way they went?’

  ‘They were still there, trying to open up the clanker, when we turned the corner.’

  ‘And you saw no one else? No sign of Artisan Tiaan?’

  ‘No,’ said Ell-Lin, and the men shook their heads.

  ‘We’ll go carefully.’ Gi-Had eased the knife in his belt. The others were not armed. There had never been a need for it up here. ‘I don’t like this,’ he muttered to Nish. ‘Lyrinx in these mountains, attacking our caravans – there’s something we’re not being told. And what’s become of Tiaan? We need her more desperately than ever.’

  ‘Perhaps she came upon the caravan. The lyrinx may have eaten her too.’

  ‘Better pray they haven’t, Nish!’ said Gi-Had.

  It was late afternoon by the time they reached the scene; shadows slanted right across the road. A breeze carried the stench of blood and ordure. A snow eagle, its beak and breast feathers tinged red, flapped slowly off as they trudged up to the wreck. The bird went as far as the out-jutting branch of an ancient pine, where it perched, watching them with jealous eyes as if they wanted to share in its feast.

  Gi-Had inspected the ruin gloomily. ‘No chance of repairing it, artificer?’

  Nish shook his head. ‘Even if we could, you’d never get anyone to operate it. Death Clanker, they’d call it, and you’d have to force them at swordpoint. The hedron would probably pick up the taint of the lyrinx …’

  ‘Maybe we could salvage some of the parts.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Nish put his head in through the opening, but one look at the shambles inside and he hurriedly withdrew. Running to the edge of the road, he vomited up his breakfast. Then, thinking how far he had to go to rehabilitate himself, he hurried back. ‘Sorry! I’ve not seen …’

  ‘Just get it done,’ Gi-Had said sharply. He seemed to be having trouble with his own stomach.

  Nish held his breath this time. The operator and passengers must have died insta
ntly, though the bodies had been further despoiled by the lyrinx. The inside looked like the floor of an abattoir. He finished his inspection and pulled away. The smell lingered in his nostrils.

  ‘The controller’s gone!’ said Nish.

  ‘I’m starting to see a story here. First they sabotage the crystals, then my best artisan, and now they’re stealing the controllers. What’s next? And why steal them? Are they planning to use them against us?’

  ‘I don’t know, surr,’ said Nish.

  ‘I don’t like this at all. It’s too big for me. For the first time since the letter, I’m wishing your father would hurry up.’

  I’m not, thought Nish.

  ‘Anything else missing?’ said Gi-Had.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘The porters’ boxes have been torn open, but nothing else taken, as far as I can recall from the shipping manifests. Not even the white gold.’

  ‘Maybe the beasts have no use for it,’ Nish said.

  ‘I wouldn’t advise you to think of them as beasts. They’re as smart as you or I. We’ll take back what we can and send a salvage party for the rest. Any sign of Tiaan?’ he said to Ell-Lin, who was standing up on the bank, well away from the gruesome scene.

  ‘None here, surr.’

  ‘Very well. Come down. Take what you can.’

  They loaded up and began the trek, arriving at the manufactory without incident after dark. News of the attack had already reached them. Tiaan had not been seen.

  ‘She was poorly dressed,’ said Nish, consulting the inventory of clothing the matron had given him. ‘Her feet were wrapped in rags. She’s probably dead by now.’

  ‘Neither you nor I can afford to think so,’ said Gi-Had. ‘I’ll make up a search party and you’ll be on it.’

  Nish knew better than to complain, though his back was crucifying him. ‘In that case I’ll need –’ he began.

  ‘You won’t be leading it,’ Gi-Had said coldly. ‘Don’t imagine I’ll be giving you responsibility anytime soon. Gryste!’ he bellowed.

  The foreman came running. Within minutes a salvage party and a search party had been formed and sent out. They searched the road all night with blazing torches, and on into the following morning, but found nothing.

  Returning bone weary and in great pain around noon, Nish looked up to see Querist Fyn-Mah standing by the great front doors, scowling fiercely at him.

  FIFTEEN

  Nish gaped at her. ‘How … how did you get here?’ As far as he knew there was only one road from Tiksi to here, and he’d been on it.

  ‘I was already in the mountains. Hunting!’ The word tolled like an execution bell. ‘Did you find her?’

  ‘Not a trace!’

  Fyn-Mah caught him by the arm. He resisted momentarily, though only long enough to think better of it. She could be the means of his rehabilitation, or destruction. He went with her to the wall where it was sheltered from the driving snow, and from being overheard.

  ‘Bloody damn fool!’ she said in a low voice. ‘What were you thinking, to do such a thing?’

  ‘I was … Irisis said … I didn’t …’ Nish could think of nothing to say.

  ‘Do you realise what you’ve done?’ she hissed. ‘Tiaan had just made a desperately needed breakthrough. We were eagerly awaiting her thoughts on the bigger problem …’

  ‘What bigger problem?’

  ‘You don’t even know?’ she exclaimed. ‘The failure of the field at Minnien. Fifty clankers were destroyed in a few hours.’

  ‘I had no idea.’ The implications were horrifyingly clear.

  ‘We’ve always thought Tiaan had potential, though only recently has she begun to show it. In a few days she solved two controller problems. Two, artificer! She may have helped us with the third had she not been conspired against. Was that malice, or treachery of the highest order? Is that why the lyrinx are all around?’

  ‘All around?’ he gasped.

  ‘The mountains are full of them. We’re losing the war, Cryl-Nish. If more fields fail, we’re finished.’

  ‘I didn’t know.’ He was stricken with horror at his folly. ‘I just didn’t know. What is my father going to say?’

  ‘I’d be more worried about what he will do. And all this for the sake of your –’ She broke off, jerking her knee up towards his groin.

  He flinched. She let her knee fall again.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re alluding to,’ Nish lied.

  The knee came up again, so fast that he had no chance of avoiding it, crushing his testicles. Pain shrieked through him as the blow toppled him backwards onto the frozen ground.

  She stood over him, looking down. ‘You dare lie to a querist? Clearly the whipping has taught you nothing, boy!

  ‘Now you listen! Are you stupid as well as a liar? I had not thought it. We have special ways of finding out the truth. I’ve been here since yesterday morning and in that time I’ve questioned two hundred people. I know everything! Surely you realise that? I know you boasted about your family connections as you crudely tried to seduce Tiaan, and then threatened her. I know how Irisis seduced you, and every jerk and thrust of your little fornications.’ Her voice rose higher. ‘I know all about her lies, how you conspired to cover them up, and your betrayal of your prober’s position. I suspect Irisis of being behind the sabotages and the poisoning of Tiaan. I suspect you connived at the death of Apothek Mul-Lym, Cryl-Nish, even if you did not actually hold the flask to his lips. If that turns out to be true nothing can save either of you.’

  ‘No,’ he cried. ‘I don’t know anything about that.’

  She fixed him with her dark eyes, saying nothing. It was worse than her interrogation.

  ‘I’ve been a fool,’ he whispered. It was the only thing he could think of to say. ‘An utter fool. I deserve the front-lines.’ He hoped the admission would gain him some credit.

  ‘You’ll probably get them. Your father will be bitterly hurt by this stupidity, Cryl-Nish. If it is stupidity, and not collaborating with the enemy.’

  ‘I would never do that, I swear it!’

  ‘I’ll leave that to your father. He can tell a liar just by looking at him.’ She sighed. ‘He had such hopes for you.’

  ‘Then why did he send me to this awful place?’

  ‘A test. Not such a hard one, for someone expected to rise high. But you failed, and for the crudest of reasons.’

  ‘What can I do?’ he whispered. Nish was not a coward; nor was he excessively brave. The thought of the front-lines was a nightmare.

  ‘There’s only one thing can save you, if anything can. Find Tiaan and bring her back unharmed.’

  ‘She’s probably dead,’ he said despairingly.

  ‘Then so are you!’

  ‘How will I find her?’ he said to himself.

  ‘A true prober would not ask. And you won’t solve it on your back!’

  He got up, holding his bruised organs. After wandering through the manufactory he ended up near the artisans’ workshops. Irisis was glowering at her bench. He ducked away. If she had murdered Mul-Lym the apothek, as seemed probable, he wanted no further contact with her.

  Trudging through the dormitories, lost in his miserable thoughts, Nish noticed that he was passing the door of Tiaan’s room. He’d never seen inside. He lifted the latch. The room was tiny, considerably smaller than Irisis’s. Tiaan probably had not cared.

  All it contained was a narrow bed, a chair, table and lamp. A rod set in the wall at both ends would have served for hanging clothes, while a small chest sat at the end of the bed, though it was empty. All trace of Tiaan was gone. Not surprising; she had been taken to the breeding factory more than two weeks ago. What had happened to her possessions?

  He found nothing in her work cubicle and her fellow workers did not know either. Nish went to the ratifier’s office, where the manufactory account books were kept. She was out, but her assistant, a slender, beautiful young clerk with red lips and a roving eye, smiled at him. Nish g
ave him the thinnest smile in return. He did not want to antagonise the fellow, nor encourage him.

  ‘Hello, I’m Wickie. How may I help you?’ Wickie stood up, holding out his hand.

  Nish shook it – a rather firm hand for a clerk – but had trouble disengaging himself afterwards. Wickie stood too close and it made him uncomfortable.

  ‘I’m on business for the querist,’ he said sharply.

  Wickie stepped smartly backwards. ‘Oh!’

  ‘What happened to Artisan Tiaan’s possessions?’

  ‘I don’t know, but it’ll be in the book.’ Wickie turned the pages of a ledger as long as his arm. ‘Here we are. Old Joeyn the miner came for them a few days back.’ He frowned. ‘Must have been when I was at lunch. It’s all written up and he’s signed for them. See here – and the ratifier herself has initialled it.’

  Nish spun the ledger around and checked the entry. ‘Thank you very much.’ He turned to go.

  ‘Cryl-Nish?’ said Wickie softly.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Your poor back must be troubling you. If you should need someone to rub salve into it …’

  ‘Thank you! It’s healing well, but if it did need attention, I’d go to the healer.’

  ‘Ah!’ said Wickie.

  Nish knew Joeyn, though not well. The old man had visited Tiaan twice down in Tiksi. She might be at his cottage now, waiting for the weather to improve.

  He ran for the village. The day remained windy and cold, but by the time he reached the lookout perspiration was stinging his back. The last part of the steep path was icy. Nish crept towards Joeyn’s hut and hid behind a tree, watching the door. He could not see anything; the fence blocked his view. He eased through the gate and onto the veranda but heard nothing.

  Pulling up the latch, he thrust the door open. The cottage was empty. The bed had been made, the table cleared. There were two plates on the hearth, two mugs, two spoons. A note on a slate by the door said Thank you, Joe. The writing could have been anyone’s.