Rebellion ttr-2

by Ian Irvine

  “Oh,” said Tali. Something bad was coming and she did not want to hear it.

  “You can imagine what happened.”

  She shook her head. “Something terrible?”

  “One morning I was doing a minor operation on my wife, against all advice. A healer should never treat his loved ones save in an emergency, and this was not.”

  “What procedure?” she said quietly.

  “Just cutting out a cyst. It wasn’t a danger to her, but it was exceedingly painful and needed to be removed. And I was so arrogant that I could not trust any other surgeon, not even with so commonplace a procedure.” Holm met her eyes, and his were so bleak that she had to look down.

  “I was also drunk.”

  Tali’s face must have shown her shock, for he slowly shook his head.

  “I wasn’t drinking that morning — I wasn’t that far gone. But, though I denied it to myself and everyone else, I was still drunk from the previous night. And when I drank, I loved to take risks and succeed in spite of them.

  “In my drunken stupidity the blade slipped, and an artery was cut, and my hands were trembling so badly I couldn’t stitch it. My beautiful wife bled to death in front of me, begging me to save our unborn son. She couldn’t understand how so brilliant a surgeon could not do this simple thing, but it was beyond me. I lost them both.”

  “Oh, Holm,” said Tali, reaching out to him.

  “Don’t try to comfort me. I don’t deserve it.”

  “Everyone deserves a second chance.”

  “My wife and son didn’t get one.”

  “Neither did my mother,” said Tali. “I blame myself, too. If I’d only done something — ”

  “You were a child in terrible danger beyond your capacity to deal with, yet you did your very best,” Holm said harshly. “I was an adult, in full control and working well within my capacities. No one forced me to do what I did. It was my decision to drink, my decision to operate, my decision to do so with reckless disregard for my wife and my unborn child. That night I swore neither to drink nor practise healing again, and I cannot break that vow.”

  “Not even after, what, thirty years?”

  “Thirty-six years; yet there are nights when I still can’t sleep for thinking about it. Times when I have to take a sleeping draught to save my sanity.”

  His eyes went to a little potion bottle on the table, then he stood up wearily. “I’m going to take a turn along the wall before bed and see what the enemy are up to. Good night.” He went out.

  Tali sat by the fire for a good while, imagining the horror of that fatal day, then his haunted vigil on the wall. She was turning to go when her eye fell upon the bottle containing his sleeping draught.

  No! she thought. That would be a monstrous abuse of trust.

  Almost as monstrous as what she was contemplating using it for. Holm was right; since Tobry had refused any further attempts to heal him, who was she to interfere?

  But she was going to. He would be practising magery up at the dome for another hour, with any luck. She picked up the potion bottle. An eyedropper inside had a mark scored on it, halfway down. Simple enough.

  She headed down to the black hole. Knowing that he took his cocktail of potions every night before bed, she dropped the measured amount of sleeping potion in the bottom of his mug, then the same again, to be sure. For her plan to have any chance of succeeding, Tobry must be deeply asleep. The draught did not cover the bottom, so it seemed improbable that he would notice. She went up, replaced the bottle on Holm’s table and returned to her room.

  And paced, three steps and three, across and back, for hour after hour. What she had done was an abuse of her friendship with Holm and Tobry, but it was as nothing compared to what she planned to do next. It had to be done, but she wasn’t sure she had the courage for it. She would have to hurt Tobry, do violence to him, assault him.

  How would she feel if he did to her what she was planning to do to him? Such feelings of outrage rose that she had to block them out. Tali covered her scalding face, for shame — she could not do it to him. It was too wicked to be borne. Tobry would have to die the way other shifters did: either insane, or put to death…

  The next thing she knew, she was outside his door with the knife in her hand. She set her candle down, lifted the latch and eased the door open. He was asleep. She could tell by the way he was breathing.

  She checked behind her, though she already knew there was no one in sight. Tali had learned her lesson last time. She crept in, holding her candle high, and watched him for a minute or two. When he did not react to the light, she put it down on the bedside table.

  He was quite still. She drew the covers down to his waist and was briefly surprised that most of the scars he’d had when she’d first met him were gone. Of course they were. Shifting one’s flesh from caitsthe to man, or man to caitsthe, healed wounds and did away with all but the largest and deepest scars.

  Tali sniffed the cup. She caught a faint whiff of his cocktail of potions, and the sleeping draught beneath that, almost imperceptible. He’d taken it, then. She banged the cup down, as a test. He did not move. He was deeply asleep.

  The next part was hard. Having been robbed of so much blood by the chancellor’s healers, the sight of her own blood aroused strong emotions in her. She could not bear to spill it, or waste a drop. But she had to. For Tobry.

  Tali had sharpened a small knife for the purpose. She held it to her wrist, breathing hard, afraid to cut in case she cut too deep and could not heal it. But that was stupid; of course she could heal it.

  She opened her vein with the point of the knife and caught the pumping blood in the cup. Her mistake last time lay in not giving him enough, only a few spoonfuls. This time she would use the whole cup.

  When it was full she sealed the vein with healing magery, then had to put the cup down smartly, before she dropped it. Her head was spinning; she was hot and cold, sweaty, faint. She sat on the bed, supporting herself with her arms, until the faintness passed.

  Tali took up the knife again. She had to do it now. This was the part she had been dreading, the very worst. This time she would be using the blade, not the point.

  Tobry’s chest was relatively smooth, which surprised her. She’d expected a coating of downy caitsthe fur, but perhaps his cocktail of potions prevented the fur growth. She reached out to touch his chest, to stroke it, then came to her senses. Do it now!

  The blade opened a smooth cut from one side of his chest to the other with almost no resistance. A terrible, appalling cut. Blood followed the blade; far more than she had expected. Tali started to panic. Quickly now. She poured the whole cup of her blood onto his chest, along the deep, spreading cut, then began to rub it in.

  She was so concerned to get the shameful business over as quickly as possible that she did not notice the sudden rigidity of Tobry’s muscles or the hooking of his fingers. He made a moaning noise deep in his throat. His eyes fluttered under his lids, as though in panic or terror. She sensed that he was trying to wake, but could not overcome the effects of the sleeping draught. Just as well; she still had most of her blood to rub into him.

  His eyes shot open, and they were the golden colour of a caitsthe’s eyes. But he hadn’t shifted yet. The blood was still running out of him, mingling with her blood which now covered most of his chest. Then, in an instant, down was forming all over him, his fingertips curving and extending into claws, his teeth elongating into fangs.

  She had to work faster. Tali ran her fingers along the gash, but now he was shifting too fast for her. He jackknifed up in the bed, blood spattering her clothes and her arms. A backhanded blow drove her three feet across the room, stumbling backwards, her arms windmilling as she struggled to stay on her feet.

  He leapt up, now caitsthe-tall, towering over her. Then he went for her, snapping and snarling, and the shifter madness was terrifying. He was many times as strong as her. Too late she understood what he had been trying to tell her before; why he had
kept her at bay.

  When Tobry was in this state, she was just meat to him.

  She scrambled away, trying to get to the door, but the shifter leapt past her and put his back to it. His claws extended; he growled low in his throat. Where was the knife? It must have fallen down; she could not see it anywhere.

  She had no means of defence. He was going to tear her apart and feed on her, and there was nothing she could do to stop him. She ducked sideways, knowing it was hopeless. He came after her. He opened his maw to its fullest extent -

  The door was thrust open violently, pushing Tobry forwards, then Holm leapt into the room, carrying a wooden mallet. As Tobry whirled, Holm struck him hard on the right temple. Tobry fell backwards and lay there, his claws scoring the flagstone floor. He was dazed, but not knocked out.

  Tali stood there, gasping. It had happened so fast that she hadn’t taken it all in.

  “Out of my way!” cried Holm.

  He shoved Tali aside and ran to the potion bottles. He poured a dose from each into Tobry’s open mouth, one after another, then held his nose until he swallowed. Tobry’s eyes closed; he began to revert to his human form, though far more slowly than he had shifted to a caitsthe.

  Holm turned to Tali, livid with fury. “You imbecile, you’ve got his blood all over you. Do you want to be turned as well — to suffer his fate?”

  “No,” she whispered. Not at any price.

  Holm dragged her down the hall into the bathhouse. “Strip! Be quick! Into the tub.”

  She tore off her clothes, numbly, unable to think, then dragged herself over the side into the square wooden tub. Holm collected her bloody clothes, avoiding the stained areas, and tossed them onto the embers in the fire box under the great coppers used for heating water. He filled two buckets from the nearest copper and thumped them down beside the tub. “I’ll pour. You scrub.”

  She took up a rough sea sponge and some hard yellow soap, and Holm poured the warm contents of the first bucket over her head. Tali scrubbed until all the blood on her front was gone.

  “Again!” He poured the other bucket.

  He fetched more water and she scrubbed herself again and again, until she stung all over and felt sure she had no skin left. He collected the sponges, tossed them onto the embers as well and washed his hands, three times.

  Tali stood there, naked, trembling. He inspected her clinically, nodded, then took off his coat and wrapped it around her.

  “How did you know?” she whispered.

  “A good healer always knows how much is in his potion bottles.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Not sorry enough! Now get out of my sight!”

  “Please, let me explain.”

  “Save your breath. You’re going to need it when you confess to Rix in the morning.”

  “Do I have to…?”

  “He’s the master of this fortress. Of course he has to know. No… more… secrets!”

  She stumbled to her cold bed and lay there, replaying the terrible scene. Confessing her folly to Rix in the morning was going to be bad enough.

  But how could she ever look Tobry in the eye again?

  CHAPTER 64

  Neither Holm nor Tali had seen the majestic figure with the tangled mane of hair, hiding in the shadows beyond the black hole. Nor did they see her in the dark on the far side of the bathhouse, but she saw everything. Blathy waited until they were gone, then slipped upstairs, barefooted and silent. She roused Porfry and her other co-conspirators, and told them of the latest depravity.

  “This cannot be borne for another day,” she said, hissing between her strong white teeth. “We have to do it now, this very night.”

  “But the enemy are outside.”

  “I don’t care!” snarled Blathy. “It’s got to be done.”

  “All right, but not yet,” said Porfry. “Sometimes the lord isn’t in bed ’til three.”

  “The lord’s throat is reserved for my knife,” said Blathy savagely. “He killed my man. We’ll do it as the clock strikes five. They’ll all be sleeping soundly by then. You lot can carve the slut and the old man, then bleed Swelt like the fat old pig he is. He won’t give you any trouble. Do the maidservant Glynnie after that, then Nuddell, and the other twenty we have on our list as cleaving to them and their foul, foreign ways.”

  She inspected the mutineers, one by one. They nodded their agreement to the plan.

  “When all is done,” said Blathy, “we’ll take the lord’s treasury and slip out the secret way, into the forest and be gone. And the enemy can burn Garramide to the ground for all I care.”

  Blathy licked the blade of her knife, spat blood onto her palm, then slid out the door and headed upstairs to await the fifth hour. She was bleeding, bleeding for vengeance.

  CHAPTER 65

  Neither could Rix sleep that night. The reappearance of the mural had so unnerved him that he had returned to the observatory to scrape off all the white paint. He then chiselled away the painted stone until all trace of the mural was gone.

  What would the morrow bring? The bloody end of Garramide, most likely. He looked over the edge. His guards were on duty in the sentry boxes on the towers, and further out the enemy’s campfires were blazing. All was still. What were they waiting for? More reinforcements?

  He directed his lantern beam to illuminate the wall, drank some wine, dozed in his heavy coat, woke and had another glass, dozed again. The hours passed. It must have been 4 a.m. by now, the darkest time before the dawn, not that there was any difference in the winter night here, with the sky so overcast and the snow falling.

  He was watching the wall, dreading that his mural would reappear from the freshly exposed stone, when Tali came stumbling up in her nightgown. Her eyes were raw, her pale skin looked as though it had been scrubbed with a brick and her blonde hair was all a’tangle.

  She stared at the bare wall, looked around wildly, then located him in the darkness ten feet away. “Rix?”

  “What?” he snapped. Why could he never be left alone?

  “I’ve been a fool.”

  “You’ve been a fool, Tobry’s been a fool, I’ve been a fool. Whatever it is, I don’t want to hear about it.”

  “I’m a bigger one,” she wailed. She sank to the snow-covered flagstones, put her head in her hands and wept.

  Rix stared at her, unnerved. Tali had suffered more and endured more than anyone he could name, yet of all the women he had known, she was the only one he had never seen cry.

  “What is it?” he said, falling to his knees beside her.

  He held her while she gasped out the dreadful story, covering the front of his coat with tears, and mucus from her running nose.

  When she finished, he let out a strangled bark of laughter.

  She thrust him away furiously, sure that he was mocking her, and stood up. Rix landed on his back, suppressing the urge to roar like a madman.

  “We’re a trio, no doubt about it,” he said. “Here I am, desperately hacking my mural off the wall, terrified it’ll reappear out of nothing and call me to serve a dead man. While, downstairs, you’re carving up the man you love like a beast for slaughter.”

  “It’s not funny,” she said, still sniffling.

  “Our stupidity is hilarious. How could you imagine it would succeed? Any threat to a shifter always makes them shift to the more deadly form.”

  “It started to work back in Caulderon.”

  He shook his head in disbelief. “Back then, Tobry had only been a shifter for an hour; the curse wouldn’t have taken properly. And he was fully conscious, the rational man in control. And,” Rix said pointedly, “you weren’t hacking a bloody great gash in him with your knife.”

  “Had to try,” she said, almost inaudibly.

  “No, you didn’t. Tobry refused you more than once. He explained why it couldn’t work, and so did Holm.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I make a point of talking to the people in my house. Why won’t you ev
er listen, Tali? Tobry’s shifted too many times; he’s run with the beasts and been one of them. His nature is fixed and can’t be changed, so promise me you won’t try again.”

  “I promise.”

  “No, look me in the eye when you say that.”

  “I won’t try to heal Tobry with my blood again.”

  “Do you think I’m stupid, Tali?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Say it properly, without leaving yourself an out — like healing magery.”

  She swallowed, looked down. He caught her jaw in his big hand and tilted her face up. “Look me in the eye.”

  She did so. “All right. I won’t try to heal Tobry again — with blood or magery.”

  “Or anything else.”

  “Or anything else,” she repeated.

  “I still don’t trust you, but let that be the end of it.”

  “You’re not angry with me?”

  “I’m furious. You could have been killed or turned into a shifter, trying to do something that never had any hope of success.”

  “It’s over,” she said bleakly. “He would have killed me, Rix. Tobry would have killed me — perhaps eaten me!” She shuddered.

  “It’s not him. It’s the shifter madness.”

  “I know, but it’s still over between us. My love wasn’t as strong as I thought it was.”

  She shivered. “I’d better go down. I’m freezing.”

  He took off his coat and put it around her like a cape. It reached all the way to her feet. “Wait a minute. I’ve got something for you.”

  “What?” she said dully. Tali sat in one of the chairs, pulled her feet up and wrapped the bottom of the coat around them.

  Rix unwrapped a little flat parcel and handed her the miniature of Lyf. “I cleaned it up.” He brought the lantern close.