The Bitter Twins

by Jen Williams

  ‘Bern? Are you well? Can you hear me?’

  Bern did not move. His head was angled away, so that Aldasair could only see the bright pinkness of one ear, and the curve of his jaw. The light was dim enough for him not to be able to tell if Bern’s chest was rising and falling, and again, terror and panic threatened to swallow him whole. The idea that this was all a nightmare rose up in his mind, sudden and extremely persuasive: he had never left the empty, silent corridors of Ebora, and he was asleep in a room somewhere, covered in dust – his mind finally completely untethered from the rest of him. Looking at Bern’s unmoving body, he almost wished it were true.

  He tucked a stray lock of hair behind his ear, and looked around the room. There were no windows. And no doors.

  ‘Jessen?’

  ‘You have never taken prisoners before!’

  The queen had been dangerously calm since their abortive attempt to reconnect with the crashed Behemoth. Hestillion’s cousin – her cousin, of all people – had smashed the crystal to pieces before the queen could reach it, and this meant that the memory it had housed was irretrievable. It was, as far as she could tell, a profound loss. Without it, the chain that bound the Jure’lia together was weaker.

  ‘We are doing many things we have not done before,’ said the queen. ‘As are you.’ They were standing outside a pair of hastily constructed cells. The two war-beasts were being kept separate, although they could see each other through the transparent wall. They couldn’t be behaving any more differently. The magnificent griffin, with his blue and black feathers and thick fur, was roaring intermittently and shouting insults. He had given up trying to break through the wall when its fibrous material grew soft and sticky, gumming up his claws, but he still paced the cell, swearing by all the roots that he would shred them to pieces. The beautiful black wolf was sitting at the back of her cell, her long brush of a tail swept neatly over her feet. She watched, with amber eyes, and did not speak at all. Hestillion found that she could barely look away from them both.

  ‘Besides,’ continued the queen, ‘what would you have preferred? Did you intend to kill them all, on the battlefield? Would you have let your war-beast tear them apart? One of them is blood to you, is he not?’

  Hestillion bit her lip. She had no answer to that question, just as she had no answer to any of the questions that had been plaguing her since she had climbed into Celaphon’s harness and urged him to fly into battle. All she knew was the fierce joy she had felt at the power of him, and then the shock of seeing Aldasair, his auburn hair flying behind him as he flew straight at her. He had believed in that moment that she was rescuing them; she had seen that in every line of his body.

  ‘Are you going to kill them?’

  The queen seemed to consider it. ‘We have killed so many of your beasts, over the years. Two more would hardly make a difference. But this is a new sort of war, and it might be helpful to know things – how many beasts we must face, where they are, what they plan. Information is a weapon for us to use, in this war. We can ask them questions. If they don’t want to answer the questions, we can take pieces of them away until they do.’ She seemed to brighten, lips peeling back from her teeth in an approximation of a smile. ‘Hestillion Eskt, would you like to sleep in a wolfskin blanket?’

  Hestillion swallowed hard. Such a suggestion was perhaps the most offensive thing an Eboran could utter. He or she would be exiled for even thinking it. But I am already exiled, she thought. I exiled myself.

  ‘I could ask them,’ she said. ‘They may speak to me.’

  ‘Yes. We would like to see, when you speak to your blood kin. To your cousin.’ She tipped her head to one side. ‘We saw him, when we crawled back up through the roots. He was one of your people then, so yes, we should very much like to see what he makes of you now. But first you must go to Celaphon.’

  Hestillion dragged her gaze from the war-beasts to the queen. ‘What? Why?’

  ‘Your creature is throwing himself against our walls again. It seems he is upset about something.’

  Upset was something of an understatement; Celaphon had worked himself up into an incoherent rage. When she arrived in his vast quarters, she found him throwing himself from one side of the room to the other, flapping his enormous wings and apparently trying to take off, despite the fact that there was nowhere to go. He very nearly crashed into her, and it took several minutes of Hestillion screaming his name before he even seemed to notice she was there. He turned his strange, blind-gaze onto her, his chest and shoulders heaving with the effort.

  ‘Celaphon, sweet one! Whatever is wrong?’

  The dragon opened his jaws, bearing all his terrible teeth. Hestillion suspected that if he’d been able to breathe fire, she would be a pile of ash and cinders on the floor.

  ‘You. Where were you? I have been alone.’

  ‘I was with the queen, observing the prisoners. She wanted my advice.’ Hestillion straightened up. ‘Celaphon, you have been alone before, many times. What is the reason for all this noise?’

  He began to pace, tail lashing behind him. ‘The prisoners. The other war-beasts, you mean. Who we caught. Who we defeated.’

  ‘Yes. They are being kept in cells not far from here.’

  ‘They are very different to me.’

  There was a hint of a question there.

  ‘They are, sweet one. All war-beasts are different from each other, that’s just in their nature.’ She cleared her throat, abruptly nervous. ‘Some will be dragons, like you, others are griffins, flying wolves, giant cats . . .’

  ‘That’s not what I mean. I mean I am different. I feel it when I look at them, like—’ He shook his head, like a dog with a wasp in its mouth. ‘Remember when you would sing to me, when I was small.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘It is like, when I look at them, I hear a song, but it is wrong. The notes hurt each other, the words are bad. But I should know it! I should know the song.’

  Hestillion didn’t know what to say to this. ‘They are our enemies. That is how it must be.’ Inside, her stomach rolled, and she felt as though she were standing at the very edge of a great drop. How had things come to this?

  Celaphon ceased pacing and threw his weight down on the floor. His big, lumpy head continued to move back and forth, as though he were watching something she could not see. She went over and sat on the floor with him, placing one hand on a giant claw.

  ‘There is something else,’ he said eventually. ‘They flew together. They moved together. Did you see this?’

  Reluctantly, Hestillion nodded. ‘I would never have thought it of Aldasair, of all people. He has always been something of a halfwit, spoilt by our aunt and indulged by my brother. But he and the black wolf were of one mind. And when we knocked him from the war-beast’s back, the other flew down and caught him without hesitation. And, and’ – she sat up straighter in her outrage – ‘the other rider was a human! They have hatched new war-beasts, and have let humans defile them.’

  ‘They all hear the song, between them,’ said Celaphon glumly. ‘And it is not wrong to them, or broken. All I have is this poison song, and I am alone with it.’

  ‘Sweet one, it will come. I promise you, we will be connected in the same way they are, eventually. It takes work. You must listen to me, obey me, do as I say and our . . . song will be mended.’

  ‘I want to meet with them. I want to speak to them.’

  ‘If the queen allows it.’

  ‘A connection.’ Celaphon sighed, an enormous rattle from deep within his chest. His breath smelled of dead things. ‘I want to feel a part of something larger, like they are.’

  ‘Yes.’ Hestillion thought of the shattered crystal, and the way the queen travelled through the Jure’lia, thinking and feeling every part of it at once. ‘I know, sweet one.’

  There were eyes in the ceiling.

  It had taken Aldasair some time to notice them. He had spent hours watching Bern, trying to decide if the big man was breathing or
not – he thought he had caught a wisp of his beard moving, so he still had hope – and then, eventually, he had lain on his back and seen it. The ceiling was made from the black fluid that seemed so much a part of the Jure’lia, and there were things, floating in it. White orbs, some with veiny protuberances, were oozing out of the fluid, moving as he moved. They were watching him.

  After a while, Aldasair stood up and moved to the transparent wall and sat with his head down. He heard the wet noises the eyes made as he moved, and ignored them. Instead he spoke to Bern.

  ‘I can feel Jessen nearby, and I’m sure that means that Sharrik is here somewhere too. She is unhappy, and frightened, but not in pain. I wish that you were awake, Bern. I think maybe you are hurt and needing to sleep it off. I’m not sure how humans heal exactly, but I imagine it involves sleep.’ He paused. ‘Your parents must be very worried. They must have seen us get taken by the Behemoth, and they probably think you are dead. At least, I think the Broken Field is safe now, or safer than it was. When I broke the crystal something went out of it, and I don’t think it will be stealing your people anymore. I doubt that makes up for getting you hurt, though.’

  Aldasair swallowed and looked at his boots until he felt like he could speak again. ‘Please do not be dead, Bern. I don’t think I could stand it.’

  The wall in the neighbouring chamber peeled back, and a slim figure stepped through it. She wore tough, beaten leathers and a stained shirt.

  ‘Cousin. I wish I could say it was good to see you.’

  Slowly, Aldasair climbed to his feet. His cousin looked whip-thin, her cheekbones jutting from her face like knives, but she also looked more vital than when he’d known her in Ebora, and she carried herself differently. Her red eyes flashed dangerously at his appraising glance.

  ‘I thought you were dead,’ he said.

  She smiled coldly. ‘Perhaps you wish that I were.’

  ‘We were not sure if you were taken by the Jure’lia, or if you went willingly.’ He limped a step closer. ‘My friend. Can you tell me if he’s alive?’

  ‘Which do you think, cousin? Do you think I was snatched, or that I held out my arms to be taken?’

  ‘I think it hardly matters, now.’ He watched with some small degree of satisfaction as she thinned her lips at that. ‘The war-beast pod you took with you has hatched, then.’

  ‘Yes.’ She grinned. There was no humour in it. ‘I have my own dragon now, loyal to me.’

  ‘What have you done to the poor thing?’

  She took a step back, as if he had struck her.

  ‘He is magnificent,’ she said, her voice low and terse. ‘A true warrior. What is this?’ She pointed to Bern’s inert form. ‘And why has it been permitted to fly with a war-beast? I have had to put up with Tormalin’s bizarre affection for humans, but I didn’t believe I had to worry about you.’

  ‘This is Bern Finnkeeper the Younger, a prince of Finneral and my friend. He and Sharrik have bonded.’ Aldasair stopped, aware that his voice was beginning to shake. ‘He is a true warrior.’

  ‘Humans are not friends with us, Aldasair. They are afraid of us, and rightly so.’ Her tone had switched to reasonable, so like her usual faintly annoyed tone that Aldasair felt dizzy. It was almost as though he were back in the echoing palace, and Hestillion was the only voice of reason; reminding him to change his clothes, to eat, to lie down in a bed every once in a while. Her words seemed too plausible, suddenly. Why should a human be a friend to him? His people had murdered humans in their thousands. He squeezed his hands into fists.

  ‘He has pretended to be your friend to get close to the war-beasts,’ Hestillion continued, in that same infuriatingly reasonable tone. ‘And it worked, didn’t it?’ She laughed. ‘And why wouldn’t it? You were so very lonely, Aldasair. You must have been such an easy target.’

  ‘Why did you betray Ebora, Hest?’

  He said it to make her stop talking about Bern, but he saw immediately that he had struck home somehow. Her whole body shook, making her look like a willow caught in the wind.

  ‘I . . . I gave everything to Ebora, to tree-father,’ she spat. ‘Centuries spent nursing the dying, and then reaching for his soul through the netherdark. And he was there, all along, wasn’t he? Yet he didn’t answer. He still chose to ignore me. It was I who was betrayed!’ She stopped, breathing too hard. She stepped over to Bern and kicked him viciously in the stomach. To Aldasair’s mingled horror and delight, the big human rolled over with a groan, his face screwed up with pain.

  ‘Bern! Bern, it’s me, I’m here.’

  ‘Do you care so much about this human, Aldasair? I’m not sure what the queen wants done with the pair of you, but I’m sure I can make some suggestions.’

  The eyes in the ceiling were moving wetly, straining to take in every detail. Aldasair took a few slow breaths, trying to calm his wildly beating heart. Bern was still alive, and this meant that he could not take risks. They were all in a lot of danger. When he spoke again, he kept his voice as calm as possible, looking Hestillion directly in the eye.

  ‘Cousin, whatever has been done to you, I am sorry. I still love you.’

  She stood over Bern, unmoving. Her face looked bone-white save for two points of hectic colour high on her sharp cheekbones.

  ‘Your war-beasts. What are they called? The griffin keeps shouting and will not answer questions, whereas the wolf does not speak at all.’

  ‘Her name is Jessen. She doesn’t speak much generally, but I imagine she will have little to say to our captors. Tell her that I am alive and well and thinking of her, and she might respond to that. The griffin is called Sharrik. I strongly advise that you do not enter the cell with Sharrik. He is very powerful.’

  ‘Celaphon is powerful too,’ spat back Hestillion. ‘The griffin would not dare to act if I bring my own war-beast.’

  Aldasair blinked. ‘You named that creature after a flower?’

  She hissed at him, then pulled her lips back from her teeth in a sneer. In that moment she looked more like the queen of the Jure’lia than any Eboran Aldasair knew.

  ‘Where is my brother? And his pet witch?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he replied, which was true enough. ‘They were not with us in Finneral. They could be anywhere.’

  ‘The other dragon. She lives?’

  ‘Vostok is alive, and very strong. They all are, Hestillion. And they are all ready to fight the worm people.’

  All of the anger seeped from her and she just looked tired and sad. He saw in her the cousin who had helped him back up when he had fallen and grazed his knee, or told him the names of all the birds in the garden. He remembered that she had had a special fondness for the emerald-lark, because she had been born in the year of the green bird, and once he had learned how to imitate its call, just to please her. He hadn’t thought of that in centuries.

  ‘Oh Aldasair,’ she said. ‘You will all die. Everything will die. Do you not see the inevitability of it? The Jure’lia will not stop until we are destroyed, and we’ve already done half the job for them. The fight is for nothing, except to prolong your own suffering.’

  She went back to the wall, which split open for her again.

  ‘Celaphon will want to speak to you all, in time. I suggest you show him the respect he is due.’

  Hestillion stepped through the hole, and it sealed up behind her.

  35

  ‘This should be the place.’

  Vintage paused, ignoring the steady throb in her ankle to survey the overgrown garden. It was a section to the northeast of the palace grounds, far from the human encampments and, consequently, still in something of a state. Bern had not yet ventured this far when he had been tidying away debris, and despite the sunshine of the bright morning it was a dark place, the grass choked with weeds and the dank smell of rot hanging over everything. It was a strange garden to her eyes – in Catelenia, gardens were lush things, full of gaudy flowers and straining with fruit trees – but this place was a garden of bou
lders. To either side of her black stones, smooth and shaped by expert hands, sat in regulated patterns on what must once have been a very fine lawn. There were seats carved into the boulders, and between one or two, even miniature bridges. It was all hopelessly overgrown, but she found that she could almost imagine Eboran families lounging here, drinking sweet wines and enjoying the air.

  ‘Perhaps they watched some sort of game from here,’ she murmured aloud. In Catelenia, there was a sport played with polished balls and bats on lawns, something Ezion had been quite accomplished at in his youth. She could imagine that too: a genteel game on the grass, music playing while the Eborans watched from their rocks.

  ‘It should be around here somewhere.’

  The pattern of boulders came to a stop at a dip in the ground like a shallow basin. It was full of a type of thorny bush, but just ahead she could see that it was obscuring something – a structure that poked out of the dip like a standing stone.

  ‘There you are!’ Leaning heavily on her crutch, Vintage shuffled closer to the edge of the dip, only to find her good foot slipping out from under her on the slimy undergrowth. With a shriek she fell awkwardly, handing with a thump at the edge of the thorns. Her ankle stabbed with pain, and for a moment she just sat, fists at her sides and jaw clenched.

  ‘Sarn’s bloody arse,’ she hissed. The grass she had landed on was damp, a fact rapidly becoming clear to her own behind. ‘Sarn’s bloody, bloody arse.’

  The crutch had landed next to her, and she had begun to pull herself awkwardly to her feet, turning so that she was on her knees, when she heard footsteps. After a moment, a slim figure appeared between the boulders. It was Okaar.

  ‘Are you quite well, Lady Vintage?’

  She had to laugh at that. ‘I’m completely fine my dear, except that, apparently, I think it’s reasonable to go stamping about in the damp with a broken ankle.’ She held up an arm, and immediately he came over and helped, quite gently, to put her back on her feet. ‘What are you doing out here, anyway?’