The Curse on the Chosen (The Song of the Tears Book 2)

by Ian Irvine

  ‘Really?’ said Colm in astonishment.

  ‘I was just fifteen. Remember how Mother forced me to wear those horrible black wooden teeth, and painted spots and warts all over me?’

  ‘It was the only way to keep you safe. A pretty girl in that lawless place …’

  ‘Then Nish dropped into the camp from a balloon he’d flown halfway across the world. He was already a hero; he’d killed a nylatl; he’d fought lyrinx, and beaten them.’ Her eyes were shining now. ‘He told such stories in those few nights he slept in our hovel; I’ll never forget a word of them. And Nish was a gentleman, too. He was so kind to me, though I was just a kid he would never see again. The thought of him sustained me in my darkest hours.’ Ketila sighed.

  Maelys studied her from under her lashes. They weren’t so different after all, for Maelys had nurtured a silly romantic dream about Nish ever since reading his tale when she was nine. And I wasn’t wrong about him after all, she thought. Ketila’s story proves that Nish was once as noble as the stories say. Poor Nish, tormented beyond endurance by his father until he believes himself a failure. Poor Nish, who promised the world he would overthrow his father, and then went back on his promise. How can he ever redeem himself?

  ‘I never wanted him, romantically,’ said Ketila, as though she’d read Maelys’s face and wanted to distinguish them from each other. ‘It was just hero-worship. And after I was left on my own … I don’t want any man, ever,’ she concluded fiercely.

  Flydd came wandering back and sat down, wincing and rubbing the scar on his back. The crossbow bolt had to come out, but now was not the time. No one spoke. Maelys could feel her stomach muscles knotting; they were wasting precious time. She glanced at Flydd, who had leaned back against a rock with his eyes closed, fingers drumming on his knee.

  ‘We’ve got to get moving!’ she burst out. ‘They could be in the valley already.’

  ‘Who?’ said Ketila.

  ‘The God-Emperor’s army,’ said Flydd. ‘Colm?’

  Colm stiffened, then emptied the dregs of his tea onto the ground. ‘What did you find after you dispelled the illusion, Ketila?’ he said quietly, struggling to keep the eagerness out of his voice.

  ‘I didn’t dispel it.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Ketila still looked wary, and Maelys didn’t suppose that would change in a hurry, after spending half a lifetime on her own.

  ‘It’s your heritage, not mine,’ said Ketila.

  ‘We could share it.’

  ‘I never wanted it, Colm; all I wanted was home and family. A little cottage would have been enough for me if I could have shared it with the people I loved. But you were different. You could never be happy with what you had – you were always reaching out for more; always expecting what could never be yours.’

  She rose, sliding the ebony bracelet up and down her arm, and headed to the cave. They followed. At the entrance, she held the bracelet up.

  ‘It’s made of precious ebony from the world of Tallallame,’ said Flydd from below, ‘which had special powers even in that magical land. But objects carried between the Three Worlds change in unusual ways –’

  ‘Change in what ways?’ said Colm.

  ‘No one would have known save Faelamor herself, for it’s different every time. Would you go in, Ketila?’

  She did so, and Maelys noticed, from behind, how little there was of her. Though she had ample stores of dried fish and other foodstuffs, and the valley was abundant with game, Ketila ate no more than was necessary to sustain herself.

  As she advanced with the bracelet, a myriad of shadows sprang up from the floor to form a confusion of tangled, moving shapes. But they were not quite shadows: they had the outlines of people with subtly aura-tinged edges. The hairs on the back of Maelys’s neck rose.

  ‘Come back a step,’ said Flydd, holding his right hand out. His lips moved, though Maelys didn’t hear anything.

  As Ketila stepped back, most of the shadows sank into the floor again, though one remained, the barest outline of a small female figure bending over a fire set on the floor. Ketila’s arm shook; the figure faded to a wisp and disappeared. Other figures, male and female, rose and moved about the cave, though seldom were they visible for more than a few steps.

  ‘The first woman would be Faelamor,’ said Flydd. ‘And the others, no doubt, her people; the Faellem were a small folk. Faelamor dwelt here for months, perhaps years, though she would not have left much of herself behind – only when she used her Art, and that sparingly. Move your arm to the left, Ketila.’

  As she complied, several larger, bulkier shadows rose and moved about, though only one could be seen clearly, a big man swinging a pick into the earth floor, then bending over to look at what he had uncovered. Behind Maelys, Colm groaned.

  ‘Shh!’ said Flydd. ‘Ah, I think I understand. Faelamor brought her most precious possessions here long ago, and hid them, protected by her perpetual illusion. She may have returned many times, taking some items or adding others, and each time renewing the illusion.’

  ‘And the other shadows?’ said Colm. ‘That man?’

  ‘Villains and fortune hunters who came after her death, attracted by the tale and the lure of what lay hidden here. Hundreds could have entered the cave, though only those with sufficient Art to touch the illusion will have left their shadows behind. Don’t panic, Colm. He took nothing away.’

  Ketila moved around the cavern under Flydd’s direction; the shadow figures rose and fell. They saw Faelamor’s outline many times, plus other small slender folk who could have been her people. A taller woman came, then more men digging under the direction of a robed figure whose face was not visible from any angle. A small, curvaceous woman came and went, plus other shadows so faint that not even their sex could be determined. Finally, what could only have been a pair of Jal-Nish’s scriers turned up, armed with wisp-watchers, though they did not seem to find anything either.

  Colm was growing ever more agitated. ‘The enemy may be encircling the valley even now, Flydd. Why isn’t the bracelet dispelling the illusion and showing us the trove?’

  ‘I don’t know; we’ll have to use trial and error.’

  Flydd had Ketila walk around the walls of the cavern, then spiral slowly in to the place where the miscreants had been digging, an insignificant hollow in the floor. She touched the ebony bracelet to the hollow and through the dirt Maelys saw a brighter, richer shadow: a long, wide, shallow box, full of scrolls, parchments, cups and bowls made from precious metals, plus items of jewellery and a small wooden ball. Colm sighed and fell to his knees beside the hollow.

  ‘Dig carefully,’ Flydd said. ‘Even the box is precious.’

  Colm began to dig with a pointed stick, while Ketila watched him in silence. Soon the corner of a wooden box was revealed, its pale timbers stained with the colour of the earth in which it had been buried for centuries. He scraped the earth off the top, and all around it, then levered carefully. The box rose out of the earth and the last of the dirt crumbled away. He lifted it in trembling fingers, slid the cracked lid off and rocked back with a cry of despair.

  ‘It’s gone!’

  The box was full of earth, ash and charcoal. He shook it out and crumbled it on the floor, raking through the little pile with his fingers, over and over and over, desperately sifting it ever finer, but of the scrolls and precious items they’d seen in the shadow play, nothing remained save a few crumbling fragments of charred parchment and an empty leather pouch.

  ‘We’ve been robbed, Ketila.’ Colm’s fingers clawed at the dirt.

  ‘No, Colm. Just you,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I would have shared everything with you. I told you that.’

  ‘Our tainted heritage destroyed Mother and Father. They had given up long before the lyrinx took Fransi, and they were glad to die with her, even though it left me all alone. I don’t want any part of our heritage. All I want is my brother back.’

  ‘Poor, penniless and miserable,’ he
choked. ‘A stinking, unwashed peasant who can never hope for more.’

  ‘All your life you’ve festered about your inheritance,’ she said sharply, ‘and if you’d got it when you were young, you might have been happy, but it’s too late now. Even if you do recover it, you’ll be consumed by bitterness. I never expected anything, but now I’ve got you back my life is complete.’

  ‘Is there anything else?’ said Colm. ‘Try the bracelet again.’

  ‘There’s nothing,’ Flydd said quickly. ‘You’ve got it all.’

  ‘A lousy broken box!’

  Outside, there was the sound of a stick breaking. Maelys, who was closest to the door, looked out. ‘Just a dead branch falling off a tree, but …’

  ‘The enemy won’t be far away,’ said Colm in a dead voice. ‘We should have run while we had the chance. You’re right, Ketila – this hopeless dream has consumed my life, and now it’s probably betrayed us.’ He stalked to the doorway, put his hands around his mouth and bellowed, ‘I renounce my heritage, every last stinking crumb of it!’ He turned to Ketila, his once handsome mouth twisted. ‘There; it’s done. Come on.’

  She caught his arm. ‘I know every ell of this valley, and the two valleys on either side. We can still escape them.’

  As she pulled her tall brother out the door, the bracelet oscillated down her arm and Maelys noticed a tiny shimmer on the floor in the darkest part of the cave. She started towards it. Outside, Ketila’s and Colm’s footsteps dwindled down the slope.

  ‘Xervish?’ Maelys said. ‘Did you see that?’

  ‘Shh! I did. Be careful.’

  She squatted down, and where she’d seen the shimmer, the top of something round just protruded above the dirt. She was about to prise it out when Flydd threw himself at her, knocking her out of the way.

  ‘Don’t touch it.’ He stood over the round object, legs spread, breathing heavily.

  ‘What is it?’ she whispered.

  ‘I–don’t–know.’

  He bent over, rather red in the face, and began to excavate the object from the hard-packed earth with one of the splintery strips of wood from the box. It looked like a dirty, rudely carved wooden knob or ball, about the size of an orange. ‘Grab that leather pouch we saw earlier.’

  She fetched it for him, and when the ball was fully exposed on a little pinnacle of dirt he scooped it up in the leather pouch, pulled the drawstring and slipped the pouch into his pocket.

  ‘I’ll give Colm a yell.’ She went to the entrance.

  He caught her arm and dragged her back roughly, hissing in her ear, ‘Don’t say a word about it.’

  Maelys pulled free and stared at him, shocked. ‘It’s valuable, isn’t it?’

  ‘I think it’s a mimemule, and if it is, it’s more valuable than everything that was stolen.’

  ‘What’s a mimemule?’

  He shook his head. He wasn’t going to tell her.

  ‘But – it’s Colm’s,’ she said.

  ‘He renounced his heritage,’ said Flydd, breathing hard. ‘That makes it treasure trove, and finders keepers.’

  ‘You didn’t find it; I did.’

  ‘But you didn’t take it, Maelys.’

  ‘You said not to touch it.’

  ‘And you didn’t, so now it’s mine.’

  Maelys searched his grim face, trying to understand. That unnerving gleam she’d seen once or twice previously was back in his eyes, and she remembered him telling Colm, hastily, that there was nothing else here. Had he done so deliberately? Had he set all this up, even come here intending to take the treasure if he could? Surely not, unless she didn’t know him at all. ‘You can’t do this to Colm. It’ll destroy him.’

  ‘Oh, yes I can. Why do you think I came here?’

  ‘I thought you came to help Colm.’

  ‘I came in search of a weapon against the great enemy, and this might help me to find one. Colm can’t use it anyway – it’s steeped in the Art of another world and he’s quite talentless.’

  ‘But he could sell it and buy Gothryme back.’

  ‘This can’t be sold,’ Flydd said hoarsely. ‘Not ever. It’s mine now, and you’re not to say a word about it. Hush!’ He put his foot over the hole in the floor and took her arm again.

  Heavy footsteps approached the cave and Colm appeared. ‘Will you come on! Ketila knows a safe way out.’ He looked from Flydd to Maelys, frowning. ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Just a minor disagreement about how to proceed,’ Flydd said, crushing her wrist warningly, ‘but we’ve sorted it out now. Haven’t we, Maelys?’

  Flydd wasn’t a greedy man – at least, the old Flydd hadn’t been – and surely he had a good reason for keeping the mimemule. Such an enigmatic old device, made long ago by one of the greatest of all masters in the Art, might be deadly in the wrong hands. It would certainly be useless to Colm, who did not have any trace of a gift, and she understood that such a perilous device should never be sold for mere money, so why did she have the feeling that Flydd was, essentially, stealing it?

  Furious at the position he’d put her in, she nodded stiffly. After Colm went out, she said, ‘I feel as though I’ve aided and abetted a common thief.’

  His head snapped up. ‘If that’s what you think, little Maelys,’ he said coldly, ‘you’d better watch your back. You never know what a common thief might do next.’

  She followed him out, her faith in humanity shaken. Ketila was several spans up a crevice in the cliff and Colm was starting up after her.

  ‘Where are we going?’ said Colm.

  ‘The Island of Noom.’ Flydd’s tone was like a death knell.

  ‘Isn’t that –’ began Ketila.

  ‘It lies in the frozen southern wastes,’ said Flydd, ‘but if I can find the right place to make a portal we won’t have to walk all the way.’

  ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘A lookout on a ridge top, with a clear view in all directions, and no trees or upstanding rocks between us and the horizon. Do you know such a place?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ketila, ‘though it won’t be easy to get to.’

  ‘There’s no choice. I’ve never been to Noom, so to make a portal there I need the perfect starting point.’

  They climbed the crevice, turned left along the slope, then into a crack running up the higher cliff. Maelys’s feelings of dread were growing ever stronger, for in the back of her mind she could feel the rhythmic beating of Rurr-shyve’s feather-rotors. Surely that meant the flappeter was close, and because they had once been linked in the contract between flappeter and rider, it might be using that link to find her.

  ‘They’re nearly here,’ she said in a choked gasp. Nothing made sense any more. Flydd had stolen Colm’s heritage and she was supposed to go along with it. Right and wrong no longer seemed to have a clear meaning.

  At the top of the crack Ketila scuttled along a narrow path near the edge of the cliff, weaving between tussocks of razor grass which stabbed at Maelys’s knees through her pants. To her left was a sheer drop of some fifty spans onto broken rock, and every time she looked down her heart lurched and she imagined those poor soldiers in the fog, lured to their deaths. It was so horrible she couldn’t bear to think about it, but the memory of the bones kept it in her mind.

  And Faelamor had killed them: the same Faelamor who had owned the mimemule Flydd had stolen from Colm. Had she used it to create that illusion? If she had, it must be tainted by all those deaths. What sort of a person would kill two thousand men just to teach their masters a lesson?

  Ahead, the cliff ran out in an overhang like a thick lower lip, after which it curved around to the right in a tangle of razor grass and thorny shrubbery at the base of the higher cliff.

  ‘Up there!’ Ketila headed towards a barely visible cleft.

  Maelys plodded after her. Flydd crouched low and went to the edge of the overhang. ‘I can see the whole valley from here.’

  ‘Be careful,’ said Ketila over her shoulder. ‘You ca
n be seen, too.’

  Flydd flattened himself further. ‘A column of troops has just turned the corner below Faelamor’s cave – I can see them against the white rocks. We’ve got to go faster.’

  They scrambled up the cleft and onto the sharp white spine of the limestone ridge. To the right, the land dropped steeply into the adjacent valley, but they weren’t going there. The meandering ridge crest was broken by a series of steep pinnacles and Ketila was making for the tallest of these, a square-sided pyramid which stood a good fifty spans higher than any other. If its top was the only place suitable for making a portal to Noom, they had to reach it, though Maelys felt desperately afraid. The sides were precipitous and it would be a dangerous climb, even if they had all the time in the world. They had to get to the top before the enemy came within range, for on the climb they would be exposed and helpless.

  They went up the south face, the steepest of the four but the easiest, for a winding crevasse ran into the limestone, just wide enough for them to inch up. Ketila went first, since she’d climbed it before. Colm followed, then Flydd, slow because of his back wound, and Maelys last.

  A thup-thup came out of nowhere and the male flappeter shot overhead, carrying a rider and two archers this time; it banked so they could bring their bows to bear. An arrow chipped stone from the rock behind Maelys, and another tore Colm’s hat off. He caught it in mid-air and kept going.

  Maelys’s eyes followed the flappeter, which had swept by and out over the centre of the valley, where it began to circle. Its rider was leaning forwards, speaking into a glistening loop – a speck-speaker – telling the army exactly where they were.

  She could see them now. Hundreds of soldiers were scrambling up clefts everywhere it was possible to force a path. Fit, strong and well equipped, they would climb three spans to her one. She looked up, trying to gauge the distance to the top. It seemed an impossibly long way.

  ‘How far to the lookout?’ panted Flydd.

  ‘Ten minutes for me,’ said Ketila, ‘but I don’t see how we can get there.’