by Ian Irvine
“Was he now?” said Lyf. “But I’m not confiding my troubles, child, because I don’t have any. Everything is going very well for me.”
“Except for the stink in your temple,” the child retorted. “You can’t get rid of that, can you?”
Lyf almost fell off his crutches. “Who told you that?” he hissed, his breath smoking. “Who’s the spy in my camp?”
“You think you’re such a big smartypants,” said Rannilt, peeping out from behind Tali. “But you don’t know nothin’.”
“I can force you to tell me,” Lyf said menacingly.
“That would break the truce,” said Tali, “and prove that your word meant nothing.”
“Your treacherous Five Heroes started it,” snarled Lyf. “They broke their word and betrayed me in the first place.”
“That was two thousand years ago. People change.”
“Some people don’t.”
“Anyway,” said Tali, “they were Herovian. They’re not my kind.”
“You’re all Hightspallers. You’re all from the same stock.”
“Axil Grandys saw us as inferior stock.”
Lyf shot forwards, and Tali’s head gave such a piercing throb that she fell to her knees on the grass.
“What’s the matter?” said Lyf, staring at her.
“Heatstone. It always hurts.” And knew she had blundered badly.
“Does it now?” said Lyf. He drifted up in the air for several feet, looking down at her. A gong sounded in the temple. “It’s time. Now we shall see.” He turned and drifted up the slope.
“He’s too strong,” said Rannilt. “What are we gonna do, Tali?”
“I don’t know, child,” Tali said, shivering.
Storm clouds had formed over the lake to the north and lightning was flickering there, reflecting on the water. Was it always this stormy in Hightspall? she wondered. There seemed to be one every week. Or had Lyf created the storm for some fell purpose?
“Why are you shiverin’ when it’s so warm?” said Rannilt, putting her arms around Tali.
“I don’t know.”
“You shouldn’t have told Lyf that heatstone hurts you. I’m worryin’, now.”
So am I. Tali moved slowly up the slope, drawn to the drama taking place inside the temple. The columns were vast, dwarfing the dozen or so people gathered at the table in the centre.
A pair of guards stepped into their path. One was a Cythonian man with spiral face tattoos, the other a tall redhead, one of the chancellor’s female guards. Tali had seen her on her first visit to the chancellor’s red and black palace, a long time ago now. Was her name Verla? The guards studied their faces and checked a list.
“You may pass to the red rope,” said the Cythonian, “but no further.”
A great circle of red rope encompassed the conference table, the leaders of both parties, and their personal guards and counsellors, who stood well back. Tali and Rannilt went in slowly until their toes touched the circle, whereupon another guard held up a hand.
Lyf was at one end of the table, the chancellor at the other. Various provincial leaders of Hightspall occupied the right-hand side, including Rix. Lyf’s generals sat in the chairs on the left, and after them were three old women dressed in white.
“Are they the Matriarchs of Cython?” Rannilt asked in an awed whisper.
No Pale slave had ever set eyes on the legendary matriarchs, who had assumed leadership when the underground realm of Cython was established. “I suppose they must be. Shh!”
Tobry looked as uneasy as Tali had ever seen him. The dark clouds moved steadily down on a warm breeze. The light faded to an ominous olive gloom. In the distance, thunder rumbled.
After ten minutes, Lyf and the chancellor stood up together and went to the centre of the table, one on either side. An attendant held up a document on heavy paper or parchment. Lyf read it, then the chancellor. Lyf checked it three times, with a variety of implements, and Tali saw the shimmer of magery on the parchment.
“Why’s he doin’ that?” whispered Rannilt.
“In olden times, the Five Heroes used magery and forced King Lyf to sign a charter giving up the best half of Cythe to Hightspall. Axil Grandys then used the lying charter to prove that the Cythians were wicked cheats, and to justify going to war with them. Lyf has hated our magery ever since.”
“He’s got magery too!”
“But in the olden days the kings of Cythe only used their magery for healing. That’s why Lyf wasn’t suspicious of the Herovians’ magery. He thought it was the same.”
“He uses bad magery now.”
Tali sighed. “I suppose he’d say he had to fight bad with bad.”
“They’re goin’ to sign. Does that mean the war will be over?”
“I hope so.”
The storm was coming closer, tracking down the peninsula towards Glimmering-by-the-Water. It was less than half a mile away now, and moving rapidly. The air seemed to tingle.
“What’s that funny smell?” said Rannilt.
Tali had noticed it too. It was like alkoyl though more acrid, stinging the nose and eyes.
The chancellor signed the charter with a flourish. The attendant held it up so everyone could see his signature, then extended the charter to Lyf. His fingers had just closed over its edge when he went still. He looked over his shoulder, uneasily. Then over the other shoulder.
“What’s the matter?” said Tali. “What’s he worried about?”
“He’s comin’,” Rannilt said in a bloodcurdling whisper. “He’s comin’, Tali.”
“Who’s coming?”
“He is.”
The chancellor was whispering in his chief magian’s ear. Time for desperate measures, he had said. Was this part of a last-ditch plan to even the odds against Lyf?
“Is he on our side?” said Tali
“He’s Lyf’s enemy,” said Rannilt.
Lyf raised his right hand. Tali didn’t see anything, but suddenly the tension drained away and he was the one who was smiling.
“What just happened?” said Tali. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”
“Lyf’s enemy can’t get through. Lyf’s blocked him.”
Tali didn’t ask how the child knew. Rannilt’s gift was quite unfathomable. “He must be an ally of the chancellor’s, then. I knew he had something up his sleeve.”
“Should I let him through?” said Rannilt.
“You can do that?”
“I think so.”
There wasn’t time to weigh the pros and cons, and without knowing the chancellor’s plan Tali had no way of doing so. “Yes, let him through, whoever he is.”
Rannilt opened her closed right fist and a stream of tiny golden bubbles streaked out towards the centre of the approaching storm cloud.
Instantly it went dark, then lightning struck the top of the temple, dazzling Tali. The thunder was a simultaneous, deafening blast. The storm exploded around them, four more bolts reflecting off the wind-polished columns, the soldiers’ helmets, swords and shields, and a great silver urn in the centre of the table. Then it stopped.
But the dazzling reflections off the urn did not. They grew brighter, extending in gorgeous shimmers and sprays of red and crimson, black and purple and violet. The urn split apart and the pieces rolled off the edges of the table. The brilliant moving colours remained, and grew. They began to take on the form of a man, a huge man, bigger than Rix, with a great bloated head and a vast prow of a nose, armoured in opal. A man whose very skin was armour made from black opal, reflecting the light in every direction.
He’s not the chancellor’s ally, Tali realised. We shouldn’t have let him through. We’ve done a really stupid thing.
The black opal was beautiful. Beautiful and terrifying. It enclosed the man Tali had seen in the Abysm, turned to stone.
Now the stone had been made flesh.
Grandys.
CHAPTER 70
The chancellor was a cunning and devious man, Rix knew.
A man well known for sudden reversals of policy. It wasn’t surprising, therefore, that the man who had previously crushed and condemned Rix now treated him as his most important ally. What was he really up to?
Immersed in these worries, he did not take in the gathering storm or notice the acrid smell of ozone. He wasn’t paying attention when the chancellor signed the paper, nor when Lyf suddenly checked over his shoulder. Rix was only roused by the lightning bolt striking the top of the temple and the slowly growing shimmer that he should have recognised instantly.
He had first envisioned it months ago, with his hand on Maloch’s hilt. He had painted it on the wall of the observatory in Garramide. He had ridden all the way to the sinkhole in that lunatic attempt to recover what he had believed to be Grandys’ petrified body. So why did it take so long for him to recognise the man himself? Perhaps he did not want to believe that a petrified man could come back from the dead.
Rix had always been afraid of magery, and now the fear rose in him until it was paralysing. How could a man turned to stone come back to life? Surely the act of petrifaction would destroy every organ in his body. He was rising from his chair, trying to understand, when Grandys caught the movement.
“Who the blazes are you?”
“I’m Rixium Ricinus.”
“Ah,” said Grandys, rubbing his huge, opal-armoured nose. “You crushed the enemy at the siege of Garramide. Come, I need a bold captain.”
As if from a great distance Rix heard Glynnie cry out and he remembered, with a shiver, the night he had been studying the mural upstairs at Garramide. He had been agonising about his own leadership failures and wishing he’d had Grandys’ brilliance as a warrior and a leader. The figure on the wall had seemed to speak to him, Follow me, and at the time Rix had wanted to. But not for anything would he follow this coarse, brutal man.
“No thanks,” said Rix.
“It’s an order, not a request.”
The man’s arrogance was breathtaking and, despite Grandys’ size and presence and overwhelming power, Rix wasn’t taking it.
“Be damned!” he said recklessly. “I’m no one’s man but my own.”
Grandys swelled until his crusted skin creaked. Then his opaline eye fixed on the sheath on Rix’s hip. And the wire-handled sword.
“Maloch is mine!” he roared. “Give it to me.”
Grandys was on the other side of the great conference table but he simply barged through it, knocking everyone aside. His armoured skin shattered the timbers and sent splinters flying in all directions.
Maloch shook wildly, rising halfway out of its sheath as it had at the Abysm. Rix took a firm hold of the hilt, turned towards Grandys, then hesitated. How could he attack his own ancestor, the first of the Five Heroes and the founder of Hightspall? He put up the blade, not knowing what to do, then remembered Swelt’s dying words. Grandys was sterile. He’d had no descendants. It also meant that Rix wasn’t Herovian. It came as a profound relief. Rix whirled and attacked.
“Maloch!” said Grandys. “Obey my command! Strike him down.”
The sword twisted so violently in Rix’s hand that he could not hold it, then struck at his face. He ducked and tried to turn the blade away. It struck again, opening a long gash across his forehead.
Blood flooded into Rix’s eyes, half blinding him. The sword twisted from his hand, arched upwards and, with a roar of triumph, Grandys caught it.
An arm went around Rix’s shoulder, steadying him.
“How did he get free?” said Rix.
“Perhaps he got enough help from Maloch after all.” It was Tobry.
“But how the devil did he know to come here?”
“All Hightspall knows about the peace conference. Wipe your eyes.” Tobry pressed a rag into Rix’s hand. “Grab another sword. I’ll keep him at bay betimes.”
Rix’s head was throbbing. He cleaned the blood out of his eyes and tied the rag around his forehead, across the gash. When he could see again, Tobry was advancing on Grandys, sword in hand. Tobry was a fine swordsman, no doubt of it, but Grandys had been a master. With Maloch and its protective magery, he could kill Tobry with a single blow.
“Tobe, wait.”
Wrenching a sword out of a guard’s hand, Rix leapt after Tobry. They fought side by side for a minute or two, and even kept Grandys at bay, but he was grinning broadly. He was toying with them. He had been a great magian as well as an invincible warrior, and with Maloch in hand his magery was greatly enhanced.
With a single blow from Maloch, Grandys hacked both their blades in two. He focused on Tobry, his eyes narrowing to points as if trying to peer inside him, then his cruel mouth turned down.
“A bag of gold for anyone who cuts out the obscenity’s black livers,” he bellowed. “Take the shifter down.”
“Tobry, look out!” Tali screamed as a dozen of the chancellor’s guards, evidently mesmerised by Grandys’ reappearance, stormed towards Tobry.
“Fly, Tobe,” Rix hissed. “We’ve got to live to fight again.”
Tobry ran ten steps to the edge of the temple, dived out over the low cliff into the water, and disappeared. As he did, Rix saw Holm’s grey head appear over a rock outcrop, then duck down again. Grandys studied Rix for a moment. “I’ll deal with you in a minute.” He turned away.
Lyf was standing on his crutches, staring at his enemy. A malevolent smile crossed Grandys’ opaline face.
“You destroyed Tirnan Twil,” he said quietly. “And my Herovian heritage.”
“I had nothing to do with it,” said Lyf. “The gauntlings went renegade.”
“You created them. For my blood-price, I’ll accept your king-magery.”
Lyf laughed hollowly. “It was lost when you walled me up in the catacombs. When I died, it had nowhere to go.”
“It went somewhere,” said Grandys, “and you know where.”
Lyf paled, then extended his right hand towards Grandys, attacking with ferocious flashes of magery. To Rix, it seemed that Lyf was drawing on all the power of the pearls, attempting to overpower his enemy by sheer force. Rix held his breath. He did not want Lyf to win, yet how could Grandys be any better?
The attack failed, for the force never reached its target. Maloch’s protective magery diverted the flashes towards the rear of the temple, shattering several columns and causing the corner to collapse in a great tumble of blocks and cylinders of limestone.
Grandys folded his arms, smiling contemptuously, then leapt twenty feet across the temple and struck, wounding Lyf in the shoulder, then the chest. Lyf screamed as the accursed blade parted his flesh. Maloch struck again, shattering the little heatstone case and scattering ebony pearls across the marble flagstones. Grandys swooped on the bouncing pearls, caught two and held them up, roaring in triumph.
Lyf let out a shriek of dismay, called the other two pearls to his hand, then dropped his crutches and fled across the sky, trailing blood. His guards and generals, and the three matriarchs, stared after him, unable to comprehend how the reversal could have come about so easily. Neither could Rix. This changed everything.
The wizened, hunchbacked chancellor approached, extending his hand to Grandys. If they joined forces, could they turn the war Hightspall’s way?
“That was well done, Lord Grandys,” said the chancellor, gesturing to his own party. “If you would come this way, we have much to talk about.”
Grandys looked the chancellor up, looked him down, then spat on his black boots. “I have only one policy, and it is war. War until the enemy have been eliminated from the world.”
Turning his back on the apoplectic chancellor, Grandys checked the temple, evidently decided that all threats had been eliminated, then focused on Rix again.
“Since Maloch allowed you to use it, you must be my kinsman.” He touched Rix on the chin with the sword. “Follow me.”
This time Rix felt a compulsion to do so, but he fought it, just as he had fought the compulsion Lyf had put on him as a child, through the heatstone in
Rix’s salon in Palace Ricinus.
“Nope,” he said, as insolently as he could manage.
Grandys pointed Maloch at Rix’s heart. “With the magery of this sword, I command you to follow.”
The spell struck Rix like a physical blow, so hard that he almost went over backwards and his knees turned to water. It was all he could do to stay upright, and he could feel the command beating at him, undermining his free will and trying to take control of him.
Few men could have fought such a spell, but Rix had spent the second ten years of his life fighting Lyf’s compulsion, and the struggle had developed an inner strength in him, a resolution that no one not forged in such fires could have had. He drew on every ounce of that strength now, directed it against the command, and broke it.
“Ugh!” grunted Grandys, as if he had taken a painful blow to the midriff. His opaline cheeks flashed red and black. He pointed Maloch again and, groaning with the effort, repeated, “I command you to follow.”
Again Rix tried to fight the spell, but this time it was stronger. Too strong, for he had given his all the previous time and had nothing left.
“Rix?” Glynnie shouted. “He’s ensorcelled you. You’ve got to fight him.”
He wanted to, but Rix could not. It was over. He lurched across on rubbery knees and stood behind Grandys.
“I always win,” said Grandys.
He leered at Tali, who was standing on the red circle holding Rannilt’s hand and looking as dazed as everyone else. “I have great need of a woman,” said Grandys. “You will come to my bed tonight.”
Rix felt his outrage rising like a thunderhead, but he could do nothing about it. Tali wouldn’t be able to resist his magery either. No one could.
Her jaw knotted. The sinews stood out in her neck and she let out a great groan, then cried, “I will not.”
Grandys looked at her in astonishment, as though such a rejection had never happened before. “Who are you?”
“I am Pale,” she said proudly.
He frowned, and Rix gained the impression that Grandys was trying to remember where he had seen her before. Tali was trembling all over.
