The Fourth Runi (The Fledgling Account Book 4)

by Y. K. Willemse

  The Lashki’s hand moved from his neck to stroke his face. Even in the slimy touch, Rafen could feel the ghoul was angry enough to torture him to a pulp. He recoiled.

  The Lashki’s face darkened. He raised his voice and said in ringing tones, “Bring the perpetrator!”

  The mechanical chant of “To Nazt” echoed around him. The crowd parted behind Rafen to allow three more people into the circle. The Ashurites released Talmon and were enveloped in the multitude once more. The Lashki raised his rod, and the chanting ceased abruptly. Shaking, Talmon stood near Rafen, sweat beading on his pale, sculpted face.

  “Servants of Nazt!” the Lashki cried. “I give you the King of Tarhia!”

  An eruption of hissing and spitting answered him.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  King Talmon’s

  Punishment

  Stepping into the Lashki’s mind was horribly easy for Sherwin. It was a sign that he was deteriorating. After Fritz had reluctantly touched Sherwin’s arm and Francisco had clung onto Sherwin’s wrist like a vice, there was a rapid sucking sensation, and everything spun out of sight. Then rocky walls sprang up around them, and shadows descended.

  “This is not the camp,” Fritz said.

  “Well, yer can hear the racket,” Sherwin said. “We’re only a few steps away.”

  Light came from the end of the narrow pathway they were on. Further ahead, there was tumult: screaming, cheering, and other unintelligible noises. Sherwin listened in vain for Rafen. It sounded like there were thousands in the Ravine. It would be difficult to find Rafen, let alone hear him.

  “There are three of us, right?” Sherwin said nervously. “An’ about three thousand of them.”

  “Two thousand,” Fritz said, his eyes drilling into Sherwin’s head.

  “Oh, tha’s so much better,” Sherwin snorted.

  He looked at Fritz expectantly, waiting to see if he would take the lead. Fritz stared back at him, unsheathing his sword very slowly. Sherwin twitched.

  “You realize, of course, that the camp is surrounded by kesmalic protection,” Fritz said.

  “But yer two got out and Raf got in jus’ now,” Sherwin protested.

  “It is easier to get out than in,” Fritz said. “And Rafen entered because the Lashki was expecting him.”

  Fritz pointed his sword at some unseen point at the end of the pathway, and a very pale beam flashed out and hit the air. A ripple of multi-colored kesmal appeared and vanished, moving like very thick mud.

  “That is how thick the protection is,” Fritz said. “Did you see it?”

  “Yeah,” Sherwin said bitterly. “I’m not two. Okay, so let’s break a hole in it.”

  “It will take hours,” Fritz said, with the first traces of despair in his voice. He strode down the pathway toward where the rocky walls ended. “We must begin immediately.”

  Sherwin followed, wondering if he could get in the same way he had used the Lashki’s Connection. He approached the area where the ripples had appeared, and Fritz hissed, “What are you doing?”

  Sherwin imagined he was Alakil. He was tall, very tall, and indomitable kesmal seeped through his skin and pores. He had no veins, because blood was a sign of mortality, and he had not wanted any of that for his immortal body.

  A searing passed through Sherwin, and he was thrown backward. He hit the stone ground with a smack and clenched his teeth so that he wouldn’t yell and attract attention. He stared at the angry blue circle that simmered in the previously invisible, protective hub. It undulated and then disappeared.

  “What were you doing?” Fritz spat.

  “Somethin’ tha’ didn’ work,” Sherwin said blackly.

  “You may have attracted the entire camp’s attention through that,” Fritz said furiously.

  “And yer didn’ with yer kesmal? Do yer really think someone’s standin’ around and monitorin’ the protection the whole time? Today?”

  Fritz paused, scowling at Sherwin. Sherwin knew they were both thinking the same thing now. No one would monitor the giant shield around the whole camp when Rafen was there. Everyone would be joining in the festivities. Perhaps the Lashki had briefly strengthened the protections, but other than that, Sherwin seriously doubted anyone had given them a thought. Who was likely to challenge two thousand Nazt worshippers in the Mountains?

  “I think the Lashki gets in with the copper rod,” Sherwin said, struggling to sit up.

  “I think everyone enters with some sort of kesmalic weapon, and possibly a signature action that the Lashki has taught them all,” Fritz said. “Francisco and I very nearly rode out that other time. I merely did a few kesmalic passes to escape. Alakil will have strengthened everything since then.”

  “There may be another way in,” Francisco said from behind them. He had been leaning against a rocky wall, staring around himself frantically. Now he indicated various openings higher up on the stone. “Remember there is the Ashurite Palace here. We may be able to enter through that.”

  “We will certainly be attacked,” Fritz said, “but we must try.”

  “What if we get lost in there?” Sherwin burst out, and Fritz’s eyes flashed as he made a motion to hush him. “Listen,” Sherwin said in a lower tone, though with the same intensity, “I’m not goin’ back in tha’ place, and yer can’ make me. Yer go explorin’, yer two, and I’ll stay here and try to break in this way. The longer we mess aroun’, the more likely that we’ll be receivin’ a visit from Nazt very soon.”

  “This is his excuse to join their forces,” Fritz whispered to Francisco. “He will go in and—”

  “He cannot get in,” Francisco said. “Did you not see? Sherwin is right. Rafen might be killed any moment. We must act. Please. For I know he is in trouble.”

  Fritz stared at Sherwin, his face hard. Then he pointed a little way behind Francisco. “There is an entrance to a tunnel back there.”

  Sherwin rose to attempt some kesmal on the shield.

  *

  Talmon staggered closer to Rafen, trembling. Rafen looked at him blankly.

  “I have been patient with Talmon,” the Lashki went on in a carrying voice. “In response to his recent treachery, I did nothing, even though he released our bait for the Fourth Runi. Thankfully, I knew Rafen would not be long in coming to us.” He placed a slimy hand on Rafen’s shoulder. “For this reason, I waited.”

  The Lashki turned to eye Talmon, a yellow-toothed smile on his face. “Hand it to me, Talmon.”

  Talmon hastened to obey, fumbling with the whip and passing it to his Master, before recoiling. An Ashurite from the crowd shoved him toward the Lashki again. The Lashki rounded on Rafen and struck his bound wrists behind his back with the copper rod. Pain vibrated through Rafen, but his arms were free. The Lashki wrapped his cold, bruised hand around the handle of the whip. Rafen was too intrigued to drop it. In his mind, he was thinking that he was free and had got a weapon – anything was better than nothing. He kept a close watch on the crowd, looking for any gaps in the thick walls of people.

  Keeping his face very straight, he attempted summoning Fritz with his mental efforts and a powerful kesmalic exertion from his left arm. As before, it wouldn’t work. Fritz was an independent agent now. Rafen couldn’t continue summoning him like a genie when the king was back in physical form. In the seconds afterward, Rafen tried summoning Thomas, even though he already knew a combining of the times wasn’t possible with the Sartian prince.

  I’m on my own, Rafen realized. It’s only me and Zion this time.

  “Bare your back, Talmon,” the Lashki said.

  Talmon kneeled near Rafen, shivering, even sobbing. He removed his tattered, once regal coat and then the numerous layers he had on underneath, until at last he was bare-chested in the freezing cold, strangely white and small.

  “You look on one who has defied Nazt, Rafen,” the Lashki said. “You once fought Nazt, and you have suffered for it.”

  He ran a moist finger along the side of Rafen’s puffy fac
e. Rafen stiffened, his blood seething under his skin. He mentally resolved that as soon as the Lashki stepped back, he would attempt fighting through the people to his left. Zion was going to help him. He would not abandon Rafen.

  “Now Talmon shall suffer for it,” the Lashki continued. “You will flog him as he once flogged you. Talmon, name the number you flogged him.”

  “Twenty,” Talmon choked.

  “You will give him three times twenty,” the Lashki said. He gently lifted the lash tip and directed Rafen’s attention to it. “It is barbed… a perfect weapon for revenge, is it not? Nazt’s revenge.” His lip curled.

  Rafen was shaking, momentarily distracted. Memories crowded into his mind: warm blood on his back; an unbearably tight rope twisted around his skinny wrists; a bloodstained post; pain, pain, pain. But it was nothing, it had been nothing! He had suffered worse since then, and now he knew what real pain was. The humiliation of the lashing had been the worst thing. That was what Talmon was lamenting as he kneeled there, quivering on the ground. It was the humiliation of being treated like a mule, like a naked animal.

  Rafen raised the whip…

  “Yes, Rafen,” the Lashki said in a low voice.

  A palpable force was at work in his limbs, bringing the snake of the whip down. Talmon was going to suffer as Rafen had suffered, at last – and then Rafen knew what the force was. He recognized the lies he had fought, the lies that he wasn’t accountable to anyone, that he could serve himself – the lies that had made him a slave.

  Rafen swung the whip sideways at the last moment, and it hit the stone ground with a crack and a slither. He was seeing his brother, lying on the settee at Cyril Earl’s mansion. His eyes misted momentarily, and he remembered what the Lashki had said earlier about the Fourth Runi’s “bait”. How could Rafen lash Talmon for freeing Francisco?

  Rafen released the whip, and it clattered to the ground. Trembling, Talmon dared to look round at him. Rafen stared back, unable to understand how they had both come to be here at the Lashki’s mercy, to be twisted by Nazt.

  He stooped and retrieved the Tarhian king’s coat for him. Talmon snatched it from his hands, his brown eyes wide and disbelieving.

  “Pick up the whip, Rafen,” the Lashki said in a deadly voice.

  Rafen fought savagely against the force in him that actually wanted to pick up the whip.

  “Pick it up.”

  The copper rod was pointed at him, glowing a dangerous blue. Rafen straightened in jerky movements.

  “No,” he said. His tongue was so thick that it was an effort to get any sound out.

  “Pick up the whip now,” the Lashki said, louder.

  “No.”

  Talmon looked incredulous.

  “Come here,” the Lashki said.

  He was only three steps away. Rafen whirled around and broke into a run toward the layers of people behind him. Years ago, he had managed to travel to Sherwin’s world. That was likely to be his only form of escape now, if he could manage to do it. Once he had put some distance between himself and the Lashki and gained himself some time, he would try. He flung out his left hand, sending a torrent of fire toward the foremost rows. A dozen different shields sprung up, and his kesmal shattered three of them.

  “If you will not punish Talmon,” the Lashki hissed while Rafen splintered the remaining shields with a knife of fire, “then I will punish you.”

  Rafen was running again, flames rushing down his arms as he made to part the people before himself. The Lashki swept after him, one hand slamming down on his shoulder and forcing him to his knees. A wave of cold thrummed through Rafen, and the fire on his arms fell away in ash. Rafen made to rise, shooting a narrow beam toward the Lashki’s head. Dodging rapidly, the Lashki moved the copper rod to his right hand and grasped Rafen’s left with his own – as if they had struck some odd agreement and were shaking hands. At his grasp, the kesmal in Rafen’s veins cooled to inertness. Rafen recoiled, trying to pull himself free. The Lashki’s grip hardened and became a circle of ice. The kesmal in his touch pulsed up Rafen’s arm in a tidal wave so violent he didn’t even feel the pain – only the power – but a cracked scream escaped him yet. A black stain flowered on Rafen’s hand and swelled, causing his skin to break and blood to drip out in great red splatters.

  When the Lashki released him, Rafen stared at it with intrigue. His arm no longer felt like it belonged to him. It was an effort to move even a fingertip.

  “Take his phoenix feather from him, Talmon,” the Lashki said. “I am going to take him to Nazt now.”

  Talmon rose and stepped closer to Rafen, his eyes lowered.

  Rafen made an abrupt move away from him. The Lashki snaked his arm around Rafen’s neck from behind and put the copper rod to his throat. Rafen’s heart thundered horribly. He cried out in desperation, trying to wrench the rod away with his hands. His left one barely moved in response to his efforts. The Lashki laughed low in his throat, and the copper rod was pressed harder against Rafen’s skin. He froze, wondering if his throat had been slit already, and in that moment, Talmon withdrew his hand from Rafen’s hem as if he had been stung. His movement was necessarily decisive, as the phoenix feather refused to be dislodged easily. Rafen felt like he was sinking. The kesmal in his veins died altogether, and the world was swirling around him meaninglessly, decorated with the flares of torches, the glitter of eyeballs, and the slimy tracks of the Lashki.

  Talmon held the phoenix feather within his fingers, and any remaining color drained from his face. He dropped it hurriedly, and it floated to the stone ground in a dreamlike manner, its brilliant light suffusing the faces of the front row of the crowd. Talmon stamped on it immediately, crushing the barbs beneath his boot.

  Nazt was a roar in Rafen’s ears. His own thoughts were screaming, and he felt he was already riding the air with them, churning in that endless dance. His breathing turned to a horrified rasp.

  “Now,” the Lashki said.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The Army

  from the Past

  Etana supposed Rafen had not realized he had caused a rain of rocks just before a dead end. For half an hour, she had clawed wildly at the debris between him and her, imagining he was still just beyond it, even though the sounds after the rock fall had told her he had run back, and the Lashki had pursued him. Once again, she was infuriated at her own helplessness, because she could not perform kesmal without her ring – and her ring was in the camp.

  Rafen was back in the Ravine. She wished she had been a stillborn. Why had she not listened to Fritz and stayed behind at Cyril Earl’s? If she had not been so foolish and insisted on coming to the mountainside, Rafen would probably still be safe. She should have trusted him in the first place to resist the call of Nazt. She fell back against the uneven wall, her head hitting the chalky surface of a rock, the warmth of his fire still in her veins. She remained in perfect silence for a while, and then she gave a piercing cry. Her hands opened and closed on the rocks, and the darkness around her had weight. She thought she had screamed for him. She now realized she hadn’t. She felt like she had to sit properly, and she rearranged herself, her hands on the hump that was her child. Her mind was with him. The tumult of the camp rang around her ears as if she were amid it, and she knew they were doing… something to him. She pressed her hands to her temples.

  “Zion, Zion, Zion!” she gasped.

  She remained there, an animal frozen in fear, too pathetically ineffective to create a hole in the wall of rocks behind her.

  And then a scratching began against the smooth stone wall of the dead end opposite her.

  “Etana!” her grandfather called as loud as he dared.

  She stared at the wall as if it might explode.

  “Etana!” Fritz called again. “Are you there? We will get you out. Is it a cell?”

  “Almost,” she said in a voice thickened with grief. She made to crawl toward the stone wall, then froze, white-lipped with pain.

  “Francis
co, keep watch,” her grandfather said. “Etana, is there a way into the camp from there?”

  “Yes,” she said wildly. “Rafen – he went back, but the rocks – you could move them.”

  “Then that is what we shall do,” Fritz said.

  *

  The ground whipped away from Rafen’s feet, and the roaring in his ears was both the air around him and Nazt itself.

  “Zion, no!” he screamed.

  The blast of wind around him ceased when someone seized his right arm and jerked him backward, ripping the Lashki’s choking grasp from him. Rafen fell onto the floor of the Ravine, his body rolling and his right hand brushing something warm on the way. His fingers closed on the phoenix feather, and he shoved it into his shirt, glancing about himself wildly. At the touch of the feather, the kesmal within him leapt to life, stronger and more desperate than before. Someone grabbed his neck from behind, and a knife glittered above. Rafen’s ray of kesmal hit them in the chest, and they collapsed. His left hand seared terribly.

  Sherwin snatched Rafen’s collar and pulled him upright. They stood back to back in the circle of people, their only other company Talmon and the Lashki. Rafen discovered that even though his phoenix feather had been revealed, Nazt was not as horridly strong as when he had been traveling underground. Perhaps he himself had grown stronger, able to see Nazt and himself for what they were. The Phoenix appeared in his mind, and he drew power from the image. It wasn’t wise to try getting to Sherwin’s world now. If Sherwin were here, perhaps the others weren’t far behind. Rafen couldn’t leave them in danger. He clenched his jaw, mentally preparing himself for the fight that was sure to follow.

  The Lashki’s teeth were bared, and he hissed through them. “So the human has come.”

  Gratitude washed over Rafen at Sherwin’s presence. His friend was a gift from Zion.

  “Yer got a problem – Alakil?” Sherwin said calmly.