The Tears of Sisme

by Peter Hutchinson

  Her face grew sober and then sad, as she returned to the present. "I feel like this ship here in the fog. I'm in a place I know well, yet I can't seem to recognise the familiar landmarks and I can't see ahead. I started off from Suntoren full of myself, my own hopes and fears, with no room for anything else; then somewhere along the way the real importance of what we were doing got through to me. I think the mine really started it off and then the Talisman finally turned me round. As for that black horror, after being in the dark with that I'm just as frightened of this whole thing not succeeding as I am of taking part in it again. Imagine that monstrosity and the Prentex coming to Esparan. Detachments of the Imperial Army in Misaloren and Hurigell. People being arrested and sold off into slavery."

  "Slaves pass through Sand City every day," Caldar reminded her gently. “It’s on our borders already.”

  Tariska shivered. "Yes, but not actually here. The Lake’s a haven, but for how much longer? Still, none of this is solving my problem for me." She put on a bright voice. "I really do want to go home, to see my father and the farm again. But I shall be more than a little put out if you and Berin sneak off in the meantime without me knowing about it."

  They contemplated that in silence.

  "About what happened in the Glasshouse..." the girl began and stopped.

  Caldar blinked at the change of subject and regarded her gravely. "It's alright, Tikka. I don't care about the past. I decided a long time ago that it was none of my business what..."

  "I hate it when you do that," Tariska cut across his explanation with bewildering ferocity. "You're so upright and so dishonest. Of course you care, it's written all over you. And I'm not in the habit of explaining myself, so you can damn well stop patronising me and listen. Anyway," she added with a ghost of a smile, "I'm glad that you care and that you can do foolish things. At least you're human part of the time."

  Caldar wisely made no reply.

  "It's simple enough," Tariska continued. "The drugs had me all confused for a while. I hardly knew who I was. But when you all turned up, it gave me such a shock I came right out of it and saw what had been happening."

  She paused for a moment.

  "Poor old Orriment. He was making a bad job of trying to seduce me and getting shouted at by the Empress for his failure. They talked openly in front of me sometimes, as if I wasn't there. Still, he was the only thing approaching a friend that I had there and I grew quite fond of him. For his part I think it was becoming much more serious than that, and that last dinner I had with him was just to say goodbye as gently as possible. It was an unhappy chance that you were going up the stairs at that moment." She turned and showed Caldar a serious face. "Now you can apologise."

  He gaped at her in such comical astonishment that she was unable to hold her expression and laughed merrily as she buried her head in his chest with a fierce hug.

  "Oh, Caldar, Caldar. You're still the same naive lad who made off with my Sarpil all those years ago." She held him off at arm’s length and looked at him with amusement. "You've never apologised for that either. I'll tell you what. You forgive me my unpleasant behaviour on the journey and I'll grant you a free pardon for all the evil things you've done to me."

  "You make it sound like a bargain," he said doubtfully, trying not to smile. "But I'm not sure …."

  "Oh, it's much too one-sided as it stands. I've got another condition too. If you and Berin go off again, I want to know about it, even if I can't come with you."

  "Don't worry about being left out, Tikka." There was a gentle certainty behind the words. "It's like Rass and the Talisman; Idressin said he couldn't lose it even if he wanted to. You and Berin and I are a part of this now, just as much as Rass is: you know it as well as I do. We couldn't break free of it, or of each other, however hard we tried."

  A little shiver, like a premonition, ghosted down Tariska's spine and was gone. She smiled. It was better to believe in what Caldar was saying with such conviction than to return home full of doubts. After that the conversation moved on to other things, leaving a little shadow of disquiet unresolved within her.

  The next day brought better weather. The rain had stopped in the night and all morning corridors were opening up through the drifting mists to reveal conical Aynuk houses perched on little islets or on the long rocky shorelines of larger islands. Patches of sunshine dazzled tantalisingly out of reach and the tarpaulins began to steam slowly as the temperature rose.

  The captain completed his trade briskly to make up for lost time, and by nightfall they had sailed clear of the Fesskins and were smacking through small waves thrown up by the westerly breeze, as they headed out into the open lake.

  Some hours later Caldar came suddenly awake, all his senses intensely alert. The boat lay quiet and still about him. Was it the change of motion which had roused him? No, he had to go up on deck. Something important was happening.

  At first the deck appeared deserted in the faint moonlight. He found himself drawn inexorably to the bows, where he came on the motionless form of the Tinker, staring forward into the night. Questions rose unbidden to his tongue; but at the very moment when he was about to speak, the realisation came to him that this was the Tinker's second body and that the 'original' was far far away. The shock of it made him shake uncontrollably for a few moments, before a strangely peaceful warmth began to flood right through him. He watched.

  There was no breath of wind and no movement on the glassy surface of the lake, yet the ship glided forward and with infinite slowness the rocky shape of an island began to materialise out of the darkness ahead. On the ship glided and even as the bow touched a jutting crag, without the slightest jar it stopped.

  The old man stepped lightly from the bow onto the top of the rocks and drawn by an unutterable longing Caldar made to follow. The Tinker turned. His eyes held a piercing sweetness as he looked back at the youth and with the slightest of gestures denied him.

  "Not yet, Caldar. Not yet." Afterwards Caldar was never sure whether any words were spoken. And yet denial and promise were both made, profound and clear. Silently as before, the ship drew away from the shore, and the youth watched man and island fade into the darkness before tears blinded his vision.

  He stayed without moving until the captain found him at dawn. "You're up early, sir." This was a paying passenger and the captain was invariably polite to paying passengers, especially on a fine morning with a good following breeze.

  "What island was that we passed in the night, captain?"

  The sailor frowned. "Island sir? In the night? I'm afraid there must be some mistake. After leaving the Fesskins we'll not see land of any kind again till we come up to Turtle Point tomorrow." He chuckled good-humouredly. "This is one of the deepest parts of the Lake. Most disturbing it would be to master-mariners like me if there were new islands popping up round here. Now how about some breakfast, sir? I know cook's just made some fresh bread rolls."

  Caldar let himself be led away. There was no point in standing still in regret. He knew he had seen more than the Tinker's second body that night. He had been on the threshold of another world entirely. And this mysterious new reality would be there for him to find when he was ready. Meanwhile he would sink his teeth into the best thing on offer this morning. Fresh bread rolls.

  ~~*~~*~~

  Maps

  A note from the author

  I hope you enjoyed this book. The young people in it have a long way to go yet as the pace of their search intensifies and new dangers arise. If you want to go with them, here are a few pages from the start of the next book, The Ninth Mihexe, soon to be published on Smashwords.

  The Ninth Mihexe

  Book Two of The Kivattar Bridge

  Copyright 2014 Peter Hutchinson

  Smashwords Edition

  Chapter One

  When the sun was setting they came to a place of black rocks. With his companions Barrada climbed the rocks and beheld a waste land of fissures and ridges which stretched as far as the eye c
ould see.

  “Rahidor, this is the place we described to you,” said Shedzib, the foremost of the companions. “Those who enter this region do not return.”

  “And if I wish to go in?” Barrada asked.

  “Then we will be at your side,” Shedzib answered, because they knew that for the Rahidor all things were possible. Had he not shown them water among the dry stones of the Harb and brought life to the barren places?

  Long did Barrada stand and gaze upon the black rocks. Then when the sun was set and the moon was risen in the sky, he turned aside saying to his companions, “It is not for me to enter here. This is truly the kingdom of death.”

  Dost el Hakla, the Dead Quarter, it was named by the Rahidor on that day and so it has remained ever since. It is often said that the Sarai fear naught. Yet not even the Fezrewi, the Crazy Ones, will venture where Barrada turned away.

  Sarai Tradition

  The Harb

  In the iron-grey light before dawn the small group stumbled to a halt and lay still wherever they dropped. Some minutes later one black-robed figure stirred and crawled painfully across the sharp stones to his neighbour.

  "Rahidor." The dry-throated croak was answered by the opening of one eye. "I entreat you, take my water. Now at the end, you at least must be saved, or all is for naught."

  Unexpectedly the haggard face before him broke into a gentle smile. "Every day it is the same request, Piddur. My answer is the same as it was yesterday, I was not chosen Rahidor to take precedence over others. Get some sleep. One way or another, the next stage will be our last. Unless we find water, we are already dead men. Today we are truly in the hand of God."

  "We remain ever in the hand of God," the Sarab intoned. Then, oblivious of the jagged surface below, he closed his eyes and fell asleep on the instant. Not so the Rahidor. Piddur's offer had disturbed him. Slowly and quietly he got to his feet and struggled up a small outcrop above his sleeping companions. He sat facing east, the direction from which both of their enemies would come: the sun and their pursuers.

  Slowly the horizon rimmed with fire and the light came, flooding the earth with long shadows and revealing a chaotic landscape. As far as the eye could see in every direction stretched low barren hills of black rock, riven, jumbled, fissured, heaped up, and unrelieved by a single living thing. Not even the driest Spinca bush or the smallest lizard inhabited this merciless wasteland and in all their history no Sarai had ventured beyond its fringes. Dost el Hakla they called it, the Dead Quarter.

  A day's hard travel here meant a few tortuous miles. Overhung gullies criss-crossed the area haphazardly; pitfalls, holes and cliffs abounded; and in a few yards the surface would change from unstable rounded boulders to razor-sharp edges that made even the Sarai careful of where they put their feet. Most daunting of all there was no water. As the sun heated this black wilderness like a slow furnace, the air writhed and shimmered over an utterly dry land.

  Their pursuers would be in no better case than the pursued, Rasscu mused to himself. The army had followed his little band straight into the Dead Quarter, as he had hoped, and a carefully laid trail had lured them ever further in for the last fourteen days. They evidently believed that the Sarai were headed for water, since both parties had passed the point of no return. That they would take such a desperate gamble was a sign of their hunger to capture him. He too had taken a deliberate risk, and it looked as though he would pay the full price. But at least the Spinner, the most important of the Sarai's enemies, would die with him and there was a chance that peace would return to the Harb.

  From the first the Dost el Hakla had surprised them with its unremitting savagery. It would be ironic indeed for Sarai to be defeated by the Harb itself, but that was now becoming a distinctly probable fate for Rasscu's party. By Piddur's reckoning they were less than half way through and they were down to the last of their food and, much more seriously, just a few drops of water. Each day was harder, hotter and more tortuous than the one before. The splintered black ridges had grown higher, the cavernous gullies deeper and more frequent, and the chaotic boulder fields more treacherously unstable.

  Rasscu wished he could share the ingrained fatalism of his companions. All of them were suffering alike in this infernal wasteland, but he seemed to be the only one who cared. The Sarai did what they could and left the outcome to God. Rasscu wanted to live. When he had nearly died on the glacier, he had learned to value every single day, and besides too many people depended on him now and his death would be the end of all their hopes.

  Idly he took the Talisman from his pocket. The object, which had dominated the last two years of his own life and which was becoming the focus of attention for many others, lay in his hand as inert and uninteresting as ever. He had often wondered if this was all some obscure joke which the Tinker and Idressin were playing on the whole world. Certainly the idea of the Talisman had ignited the Sarai people and looked likely to be another flashpoint among the rest of the Empire’s troubles. The reality of it, the thing itself . . . well, that was something else.

  He placed the Talisman on the rocky surface in front of him and for the first time since it had come into his possession almost twelve months ago, he considered it. There had never seemed to be any time before; now there was no conceivable reason to hurry.

  It was very ordinary. A large pebble. About four inches long, flattened and smoothed as by the natural erosion of centuries, narrower at one end than the other, a uniform grey slashed by two thin diagonal bands of white quartz. He had seen all this a hundred times before. Yet now, when he looked closer, he could see that it was in fact paler at the narrow end. The grey darkened almost imperceptibly after each white intrusion and even the quartz was not the even white he had assumed.

  Until this moment the Tesserit's attitude towards the Talisman had been unthinkingly protective. Most of the time he had been too busy to give it any attention, automatically keeping it hidden and refraining from talking about it in the vague hope that others would forget about it also. Before he set out on this encounter with the Spinner he had decided to leave it behind in Remakkib's keeping. But when it came to the point, he had found himself unable to part with it and with some reluctance he had brought it with him into danger.

  He realised now that from the start the attitudes he had taken towards the Talisman were the ones he found comfortable. It was pleasing to see himself as a guardian of something and the business of guardianship excused him from ever considering the thing itself or his true relationship with it. At bottom he was afraid of it. No, that wasn't quite true; who could be afraid of something so totally inert? And yet he was in fact afraid. Of what? What was at the core of this fear which spun him away and threw up these ready made roles like a concealing screen? Idressin would know. But Idressin was no longer on the Harb, and when he had been, Rasscu had not thought to ask. There had always been something more pressing to attend to. Perhaps if he …..

  Rasscu caught himself. He was wandering off into 'shoulds' and 'coulds' and 'I wonder whys' again, when the object of his concern was actually right here under his nose. He sat quite still and for the first time brought his whole attention to bear on the Talisman itself.

  The sun climbed swiftly and banished the blessed coolness of the night. True to its name, the Dost el Hakla lay as motionless as death itself under the mounting glare. None of the Sarai so much as stirred at the touch of the advancing sunlight, while above them, seated on his outcrop, the Tesserit had become as still as the rock of the Harb.

  From the moment he had stepped aside from the tangling web of his thoughts, Rasscu's gaze had been on the Talisman. As the reality of the object itself impacted on him for the first time, his perception began to sharpen, until every tiny grain and crystal and cavity on its surface was simultaneously clear in his vision. He was beyond questioning how this could be so, and he did not withdraw when the first startling touch of the Talisman's presence brushed his consciousness.

  All at once the wider of the ban
ds of crystal began to dance with light and he was drawn forward into the essence of the Talisman. He found himself apparently standing on level sandy ground, confronting at a distance of a hundred paces a tremendous white wall, which stretched beyond the limits of sight above and to each side. He wanted to step towards it. Within moments the desire to move forward was flooding every fibre of his body, but he could not stir and even as he groaned, aching at his own unbearable impotence, he felt himself being turned around. The shimmering wall slid around behind him and in its place the Empire lay spread out below, as if he was in some high place. Just as when he observed the Talisman, he could see it all and yet the smallest details were clear and sharp.

  He saw his pursuers rousing themselves to inch forward for another painful day, and Remakkib waiting in evident anxiety at the edge of the Quarter. Further out on the Harb an army supply column was getting ready to move to the next bhereth, watched by unseen Sarai scouts. Further he looked and further: beyond the plateau the whole Empire was in turmoil, signs of war everywhere, smoke from burning villages mingling with the fumes from the furnaces of the steel-makers, dense columns of humanity travelling the roads, the squads of army conscripts looking little less dejected than the families fleeing from the destruction of their homes. Far to the north heavily armed soldiers trudged through the snow towards a dark defile where men waited in ambush. Far to the south a whole village was decked out in bright colours for a festival.

  All this was clear to his first glance, and hard on its heels came the realisation that it was but a small part of what was open to him. All life in the Empire crowded in upon him, from the eagles soaring in the mountains to the spiders in dark city warehouses, from the giant beeches in the groves of southern Belugor to the worms crawling under the grass of the Gorobi plain. The vast impression came to him whole and burst his consciousness apart. At the first flash he split into a thousand tiny fragments and his vision went dark. Some moments later he found himself seated, as he had been, on a small outcrop, facing a dull grey pebble.