‘I should like to see such wonders.’
‘If you wish, a telescope will be built for you on one of the highest crags.’
‘I do wish it.’
Zaravaz turned upon the damsel a look of desire so extreme it might melt basalt, like plutonic fires. Impetuously she reached out to touch him, but at that moment a group of horsemen passed by along the shores of the lake, and when she glanced down she saw the almond-eyed face of some lakemaiden peering up from beneath the water. Disconcerted by these intrusions Asrăthiel drew back.
Her lover smiled again, as if possessing some singular knowledge, and appeared to scrutinise the constellations. A breeze arose. As the boat skimmed across the water, behind him the silken length of his hair streamed like a cloud unravelled by the wind.
9
CROWTHISTLE
What is the wisdom of Queen Night,
Whom shining stars adorn?
She knows we yearn to reach those lights,
For of them we are born.
SUNG BY LAKE MAIDENS
Aoust the twenty-eighth was Asrăthiel’s birthday. She had not mentioned the fact to anyone in Sølvetårn, yet apparently it was common knowledge. A party was got up, and the whole of the fastness seemed to be celebrating, or else using it as an excuse for revelry. As time passed the damsel had found ways to make herself more able to endure her yearnings for home, her straitened circumstances, the banishment from the company of family and friends. In her unseelie lover she saw what she desired most of all and least of all. He was with her every day. Before nightfall she would fall asleep, and when she opened her eyes he would always be gone. In the evening when he first set eyes on her, he would kiss her hair casually, but no more than that.
His thoughtfulness was constant, his generosity boundless. Often she would glance up, by chance, to see him watching her with that curious look of intense longing. He laughed and jested; his witticisms could provoke uproarious hilarity; he could evoke the most moving music from the strings of a violin.
Occasionally, when they traversed the underworld together, she would place one hand upon the shoulder of Zaravaz and the other upon a rock of the living mountain, and then he would let her read the geological story of the mineral, and reaching deeper, the story of the making of the world. That way she learned of the ranges’ birth; how they had begun beneath an ancient ocean as layers of pebbles and stones, sand and mud, mingled with the shells and skeletons of primeval creatures, and how the layers had built up until their weight had forced their particles together to become hard rock, one of the slowly moving dorsal plates on the world’s restless reptilian hide. Two plates had collided, grinding together, and the lip of one slid over the edge of the other. Dragon’s-breath heat from deep inside the world liquefied some of the lower plate’s rock to magma, while huge forces produced by the spinning core of iron at the planet’s heart began to lift the seabed. Great slabs of rock along the line of collision were forced upwards. Fiery magma jetted up through fragile spots, forming a row of volcanoes. As the two plates continued to slide together the buckling, twisting layers of rock were forced higher, while the volcanoes also grew, so that the range reared into the skies. The tremendous forces from beneath never ceased their slow violence, transforming the hard-pressed layers of seabed sediment into metamorphic or igneous rock, folding and cracking them to create faults, splitting the mountain range into blocks and grinding them against each other. Every year for millennia the Northern Ramparts grew a few inches taller.
As a weathermaster, Asrăthiel knew that even as the mountains were being born they were being worn away. Rainwater flowed into rocky crevices, turning to ice on the higher slopes. The ice’s expansion thrust the cracks wider, eventually causing bits to break off with a sharp report and fall down the hillside. Broken fragments collected in piles at the foot of the slopes. Spores, too, took root in the hairline crevices that netted the moist rock faces. Lichens and mosses clung, their exploring roots making the rocks crumble.
Wind swept away the dislodged rocks. Rain and snowmelt washed them into streams. As they rolled down the streambeds they scraped away more of the mountain’s flanks, while being ground down to lesser sizes. The rushing waters of rivers and streams excoriated deep furrows and valleys in the mountainsides. Rocks locked into glaciers abraded the land as they slid imperceptibly downhill towards the sea, where the ice would finally set them free to mix with other sands and muds to form new sediments. In the oceans the mountains began their saga and there they would ultimately return, to begin their cycle anew.
Asrăthiel was entranced by the life story of the planet as she received it through the influence of goblin gramarye, though no spell enthralled her like her lover. Unfailingly Zaravaz amazed the damsel. His eldritch gifts allowed him to move with a speed to outwit the eye, and with extraordinary precision. He could spring high and twirl four, five, six times before he landed. She had seen him catch hold of a rocky overhang and easily draw himself up on top of it by the pure strength of his arms. He could vault a high tor with no difficulty at all. While galloping at full speed on his incandescent daemon horse he could jump to his feet and ride standing up, or swing himself down beside the steed to cling sideways, along the length of its body, so that an observer might not know the trollhäst had a rider. Brazenly he flaunted himself before Asrăthiel; flaunted his beauty, his prowess.
Altogether he was appealing, confident and vivacious, yet in her life with him Asrăthiel was beset by doubt and loathing more often than not. She could not countenance the acts of cruelty he permitted to take place within his realm. To survive without losing her sanity she had to develop ways to push goblin atrocities from her mind before they overwhelmed her.
Zaravaz was not always at her side. Often he went away on business he would not give an account of, and she felt it best not to enquire in case it gave her nightmares; then she would walk alone on the mountains, for their strength and grandeur pleased her, and she could watch when goblin warriors went swooping on the virgin snow of the higher ridges, sending up plumes of ice-crystal powder as they plunged thousands of vertical feet in a controlled slide.
One windy night as clouds trailed like smoke across the moon, Asrăthiel was progressing along a narrow path when she spied, on the other side of a ravine, three human men in tattered clothing, lying beneath eaves of lichened rock. One was cowering and ranting, his comrade was coughing fit to burst, and the third was cradling his feet in his hands, whimpering as if they hurt him lamentably. Asrăthiel’s first reaction was astonishment at beholding human beings in the environs of Sølvetårn; promptly she recognised the signs of arsenic poisoning; kobolds had lingered near those men, or had been handling them or mistreating them. The weathermage called out to the trio but they made no reply, perhaps not having heard over the bluster of the wind, perhaps being too wrapped in their private agonies. Wondering how they had arrived there and where they had come from she began to run towards the ice bridge that spanned the chasm, so that she might cross over and speak to them, but on the way she caught sight, through a gap between two boulders, of grinning kobolds riding on the backs of five more men, thrashing them with whips to make them go faster.
Bristling with indignation, Asrăthiel veered off her course in the wake of the kobolds. Translucent orange flames flared behind a bluff of rugged stone; rounding a corner she happened upon a group of goblin knights, amongst them Lieutenants Zauberin and Zwist. They had with them some mortal wretches in chains, who were hobbled, like sheep. Close at hand, kobolds were heating irons in a fire. From a distance, transfixed by horror, Asrăthiel watched as Zwist seized the men by the back of the neck and branded them on the shoulder, one by one.
‘What are you doing?’ she shouted.
Zauberin glanced sardonically in her direction. ‘Killing time,’ he called out.
With a cry of protest the damsel ran forward to help the suffering prisoners, but kobolds bundled them out of her sight. All she could do was engage in serious re
monstration with the knights. ‘You ride these men and brand them! Stop this torment!’
‘Lady Sioctíne, these beishtyn were selected for our purpose,’ Zwist politely responded, ‘because they are strong and can run fast. And all have been chosen from amongst racehorse owners, horse-breakers, trainers, jockeys.’
‘Not jockeys,’ Zauberin interjected, smiling as he passed by.
‘Nay, in sooth, for jockeys are too small to run swift, so they are, well—’ Zwist said, ‘how shall I put it delicately? I believe the euphemism used by humankind in horseracing is “sold”.’
‘Where did all these men come from?’ Asrăthiel demanded.
Zauberin, returning, said, ‘Some were recently captured, others were taken prisoner during the battles and have just now arrived here, having been herded across the land at their slug’s pace. We allow them to roam the Northern Ramparts, for they are unable to break through eldritch barriers they cannot see—unable to return to the kingdoms of men. They are kept for divertissement. We play with them, hunting the hunters from time to time, fishing for the fishers or letting the kobolds ride the horse-breakers. We keep some in a big glass bowl for entertainment, like goldfish.’ Plainly enjoying the damsel’s reaction to his pronouncements Zauberin went on, ‘Zwist is as enthusiastic about racing as any of us. We watch, we cheer, we bet on the outcomes. Often we give stimulants to the racers to make them run faster, for it adds to the excitement. And after the last race concludes we make men who once owned fighting cocks duel against each other with spurs on.’
But Asrăthiel turned away from Zauberin in cold rage and would listen to him no longer.
To Zwist she said, ‘I had thought of you as polite, gallant, solicitous and helpful, utterly unlike any preconceptions of goblin hordes, and now I have seen you at this appalling work. You have shocked me back to reality. I was a fool. Never was there a truer saying, “Be wary of wights. Be especially wary of unseelie wights.’’ ’
‘I vow, Lady Sioctíne,’ said the knight, ‘I will never harm you while you are under the protection of the horde. I vow the same for all the Glashtinsluight, and you must believe me, for we do not lie and we cannot help but honour our word as you know.’
‘You mistake my meaning. It is not myself I am concerned for,’ she said, and she took herself from their company.
Next night, in a tall barge draped with cloth-of-silver, Asrăthiel was floating with Zaravaz upon Ice Axe Tarn, mirrored and mist-twined. She brooded upon the situation of the horde’s captives, and wondered how she could aid them. Her anguish was extreme. She was torn, unbearably, between hating her lover for authorising—and probably encouraging—the savagery she had witnessed, and yearning only to cleave to him, excluding all others.
Some women, Asrăthiel knew, claimed to be attracted to ‘bad’ men, but she had never subscribed to that view or even come close to comprehending it. Cruelty could never compel her admiration—on the contrary, she despised it with heart and mind. It violated everything she stood for. Her anger and confusion rose like a flood, drowning out coherency, and for some while she had been unable to bring herself to speak.
Clouds muffled the sky, and there was no breeze. Silver filigree lanterns hung at prow and stern, casting circular pools of clear white light around the boat, their radiance penetrating several yards into the walls of fog.
‘Why have I not seen your human slaves before?’ Asrăthiel asked suddenly.
‘Oh, so you have found your tongue at last,’ said Zaravaz, ‘and the boddaghen also. They have been kept from your sight, lest their mewlings should distress you.’
‘An ill secret, ill kept.’ As she said this, Asrăthiel knew what look would flash into his eyes. She dared not glance up, but stared out across the water. ‘Your harshness is beyond belief.’
The mists parted and she spied a group of bobbing lights, weak and yellow as withered dandelions. Ragged, emaciated men were straggling across the tarn in a flotilla of ramshackle boats, which they rowed with their hands. The damsel’s heart went out to them in pity.
‘They are starving!’ she said indignantly to her companion, who turned his head to see what had caught her attention. ‘Give them food and let them go.’
The goblin king did not reply, but a deeper stillness settled upon him. Asrăthiel recognised that stillness and her senses sharpened.
Small baskets woven of reeds plugged with clay came bobbing on the water. Some little fruitcakes nestled therein. Noticing these dainties, the men began to paddle eagerly towards them.
‘It is clear to a blind man that this is some trap!’ Asrăthiel cried. ‘Those victuals are illusions created by glamour. I daresay they are nothing but pebbles, or wads of moss.’ She shouted a warning to the men, but they took no notice. ‘They are under some spell or curse!’
Zaravaz said coolly, ‘Perhaps hunger is a curse.’
She called out again, but the goblin king gestured decisively with one hand. Their silver-draped barge tilted to one side and began to slew around to face the opposite direction. Before the men disappeared from view, however, the damsel saw them lean out of their vessels and grab the cakes, stuffing them into their mouths. Inclined lines, like bare willow withies, sketched themselves faintly against the mist . . .
The vapours closed in, muffling sounds, but through the thickness Asrăthiel heard a series of tremendous splashes. They were followed by spluttering and thrashing, as if paddles flailed in the water, interspersed with the sound of screaming. Waves fled across the surface, rocking the barge. Through the thinning mist Asrăthiel discerned a row of whip-like rods angling up from the shore, bending and bucking. The graihyn were winding in their catch.
‘Stop this barbarity!’ Asrăthiel shouted, but the goblin king spared her not so much as a glance, and the barge approached the land, bumping against the rocky shore. Zaravaz leaped onto dry land, but as he did so, a dirty human man ran up and prostrated himself at his feet.
‘Lord, I beg for mercy,’ said the man, too terrified to raise his eyes from the ground. ‘Do not treat us like animals.’
‘Are you not animals?’ Zaravaz said in astonishment. ‘Are you trees, or stones? You yourself, fisherman,’ he continued in a voice of steel, ‘have served other creatures worse than you are being served.’
‘Great lord,’ moaned the supplicant, ‘we are not like dumb beasts and do not deserve to be treated thus. We have character, spirit and speech. Beasts are not the equals of mankind!’
‘Surprising news,’ said Zaravaz. ‘You are wrong.’ He shot a quick look at Asrăthiel—who was climbing out of the barge—and added, with an air of sorely tried patience, ‘Let me teach you, fisherman. Your prey is infused with social intelligence. They recognise individuals, and are mindful of complicated social relationships. Fish display consistent cultural traditions, and cooperate with one another to examine predators and gather food. Some wield tools, some construct houses, others tend underwater gardens. Their memories are exceedingly long. Their spatial memory is as good as that of your own kind; they can create complex cognitive maps by which to navigate. They feel agony as you do, for the pain centres in their brains match your own. You think they have no language? Their communication is not by speech but by pulses of electricity or by movement, or by altering their colours.’
Zaravaz stared haughtily down at the man, who had hoisted himself onto his knees. ‘Fisher, is the way you view the world necessarily unbiased? Is it the only way? I will answer; no it is not, for like your fellow men your viewpoint is self-centred and narrower than a worm’s gut. You, who have only ever seen fish contorting in the bottom of a boat or dead on your plate, would not know any of the secrets of this remarkable race. So go you now, fisher, and flop about on a hook, that you may learn how they die, if not how they live.’ He made a gesture as if flinging away a stone and the dirty man fell over backwards. Sobbing, he scrambled away. Zaravaz watched him depart, displaying no sign of emotion.
Asrăthiel approached the unseelie king. She
was shaking from head to toe. ‘You tell me,’ she said, her voice trembling, ‘that you wish to make me glad. Do so by ceasing at once your torment of these people. Release them!’
He turned his shoulder and began to walk off. ‘It pleases me to please you when the whim strikes me,’ he threw back in wintry tones. ‘But never delude yourself that you rule me.’
Zaravaz was well aware of Asrăthiel’s hostility to his unkindness, but he made no alteration to accommodate her views other than, she surmised, generally separating her from scenes that would upset her. He could not be bothered with people who opposed him, and if she made a fuss he simply went away.
This, too, was difficult to bear.
To make matters worse, First Lieutenant Zauberin had taken to slyly winking at the damsel. She had overheard him, behind her back, derisively referring to her as ‘the king’s eager pupil’ and ‘his noonday dancer’. Recently that knight’s every gesture, glance and word seemed filled with innuendo, so that she felt sullied in his presence, and she shunned him whenever she could. At such times Asrăthiel would say to herself, Once I was a powerful weathermage. Now I am reduced to being the doxy of a Lord of Wickedness, infatuated with a misanthropist who is rightly accursed and reviled by my race.
Zauberin always made certain his leader was out of earshot when he quipped. ‘How merrily the water tumbles down yonder cliffs,’ he said to Asrăthiel, pointing out the view through one of the windows. ‘A pretty morning for a tumble, is it not?’ and he pinned her with a meaningful smile, clearly tickled by her angry blushes.
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