The man wearing the shells screwed up his eyes and turned his face to the sky. His upthrust hand began to tremble and soon his whole body was shaking. Nothing happened. No murderous shards of ice stabbed the spearman. No painted fire split his scarred skin anew or melted his flesh and burned his bones to ash. He didn't collapse, frothing at the mouth as he drowned where he stood, or clawing at his throat as the very breath of life was denied him. Instead, taking everyone by surprise, he sprang forward and struck the newcomer a brutal blow with his clenched fist.
The newcomer fell sideways, knocked clean off his feet. He didn't try to get up, just cowered in the black dirt, weeping now, utterly desolate. When the scarred hunter took a pace towards him, he scrambled away on hands and knees, wailing like a child. His followers recoiled, some blank-faced with this new shock. Other faces were more resigned, showing that a fear they had dared not voice had now been realised. A few turned around and began trudging back the way they had come.
The scarred hunter didn't let the supposed painted man escape. In a few strides, he caught him and ripped the strings of shells from his neck. The pale shells scattered across the dark mud. One of the newcomers stamped on one, crushing it with vehement fury. A village spearman stepped up to offer the scarred hunter his club. The scarred hunter raised it above his head and the powerless newcomer curled up in futile protest. The stone-studded
club crashed down, not to dash out the powerless man's brains but to thud into the earth beside his ear.
The scarred hunter said something the old woman didn't catch as he handed the club back to the spearman, his face twisted with strange regret. He turned to the rest of the newcomers, spurning the powerless man grizzling at his feet with a vicious kick. Raising his voice, he told them firmly that if they wished to stay, they could. If they did their best for the village, then naturally they could share in whatever food or water they brought to the hearth. There was a catch in his voice as he acknowledged that this village had recently lost more people than it could easily spare in the fires that had swept through the grassy plain. Though no one living here had any interest in being subject to anyone who might claim to be a painted man, he said firmly. The village men and women voiced their agreement. Several of the newcomers looked anxiously at the sky as if they expected a beast to appear to avenge their leader's humiliation. None appeared. The scarred hunter looked as if he might have said more but shut his mouth resolutely instead.
One of the newcomers ducked his head submissively as he assured the scarred spearman that he would work hard for his food and water, and fight for this village besides, if he were to be trusted with a spear. The newcomer gazed down at the powerless man still huddled on the ground, his head hidden in his arms. Their painted man hadn't been able to slow the burning rock that had spilled from a fissure and consumed their village. Whatever he had done for them in the past, he had been helpless against this new calamity.
They had been walking for days, one of the women said angrily, and whenever they had asked him to use his powers to find them water or bring them food he had refused, saying they hadn't yet reached a place that pleased him. The powerless man whimpered.
The scarred spearman shrugged and said that if the newcomers wished to eat now, they should start working. The broad-hipped mother who had taken the old woman in stepped up beside him. Indicating salvaged gourds by the hearth, she suggested the newcomers begin by fetching water. Though it wasn't an easy walk inland, she warned, to find the point where the river still flowed rather than stood still and spoiled. All the other springs had dried up here as well.
One of the newly arrived women clutching a limp and dull-eyed baby to her breast fell to her knees, sobbing with gratitude. The old woman joined the rest of the village mothers as they welcomed the newcomers with assurances that the worst of their trials were over. The hunters paired off with the newly arrived men, some heading off to help rebuild the defences, others explaining how the lie of the land had been so dramatically changed. No one spared a second glance for the wretched man still lying in the dirt and keening softly, clutching one of his golden shells in his filthy hand.
What did it mean, the old woman wondered, if the painted men and women had truly lost their powers? And had the beasts gone for ever?
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Kheda drew his hand back slowly, his eye fixed on the plump bird insouciantly probing the sandbank with its fine spike of a beak. He threw the stone hard and true and the bird fell in a flurry of feathers.
'Well done.' Risala gave a soundless clap from the slanted deck of the Zaise, careful of her splinted and bandaged wrist.
Kheda grinned up at her. 'You wouldn't care to go and get it, would you?'
She smiled down with a shake of her head. 'You shot it, you fetch it. I've done enough today carrying water.'
Kheda looked inland to the pit he had dug in the deepest channel that was still nonetheless as dry as a bone. At least there was water far beneath in the sand. And ironically, more water than they wanted was edging up the slope that the upheaval had made of the river mouth. The floods filling the grassy plain were slowly reclaiming the channels. His pleasure in securing fresh meat abated somewhat.
We 're not drinking that water, stagnant and tainted with whatever's rotting beneath it. And it's bringing far too many insects to bite us and that could lay us low with whatever foul fevers this land might harbour.
He tried for a reassuring smile as he turned back to Risala. 'Did you see anyone?'
'No one.' Risala sighed. 'Nothing alive bar a few new birds, those little striped lizards and far too many flies.'
'Those people who stayed back on the higher ground must have been safe,' Kheda said stubbornly. 'We saw smoke from a fire, didn't we?'
'Who's to say who or what lit it?' Risala glanced involuntarily over her shoulder. 'If you want to find that village again, you'll have to go and look for yourself.'
'I think we can wait until someone finds us, if someone risks those floodwaters. I can't see any easy path for us inland, not if we have those two to help along.'
It's no bad thing that the twists of this channel hide us from view from inland. I don't suppose those wild men and women would be too impressed if they came to us looking for help and found our vaunted mages wholly incapable. And I don't think any of us want to get entangled in their affairs again.
Kheda followed Risala's gaze towards the stern cabin. 'Is she trying to scry again?' he asked quietly.
'For the third time today.' Risala nodded, half-concerned, half-exasperated. 'I told her she should wait till tomorrow, or at least until after noon.'
'You don't imagine she'll listen, do you?' Kheda shook his head, resigned. 'How's Naldeth?'
Risala answered with a shrug. 'Still just sitting and staring at his hands.'
Kheda shook his head, frustrated. 'I wish he'd let me see what's happening under those bandages. Or take some poppy syrup. He must be suffering agonies.'
'You don't think he's afraid of how much it might hurt if you need to re-splint his fingers?' Risala suggested with a shudder.
Kheda gave another sigh. 'I'd better go and find that bird before green ants eat it.' He trudged over the dessi-cated sand and picked up the dead bird. Digging a shallow pit with the square end of the single hacking blade they still had between them, he gutted it carefully with Risala's dagger and buried the entrails. Pausing to wipe the sweat
from his forehead before it drew too many flies, he looked back at the Zaise, wedged in a curved hollow, masts broken, her deck a hollow ruin. Then he looked back out to the west. The ship rested high and dry an astounding distance from the sea.
What are we going to do if both wizards' powers continue to fail them? Risala and me are hardly going to carry theZaise over those exposed reefs and out to the sea between us. Though the ship's not going to be seaworthy, even if we could.
Retracing his steps, he threw the bird up to thud onto the deck and pulled himself up the dangling rope ladder.
Sitting on the rail, he began plucking the bird, letting the feathers drift idly away to be lost on the steady breeze coming in from the distant ocean.
Risala studied him. 'What are you thinking about?'
Kheda continued stripping away feathers. 'Arrogance,' he said after a long moment. 'I keep wondering how I could have been so arrogant as to think I could just change what didn't suit me about this place, because I was a warlord and that's what I wanted.'
'It wasn't just you,' Risala protested quietly. 'They were at least as determined to work their will here.'
'And we all just dragged you along with us.' Kheda tried to rid himself of down sticking to the blood on his fingers.
'I had a choice,' Risala reminded him. 'I came because I wanted to, because I believe in you, because I believed we had to find out just what might threaten Chazen.'
Kheda glanced at her. 'At least they had their magic to encourage them to think they might actually be able to do something about any dangers lurking here.'
'You don't think their magic just made them more arrogant?' countered Risala. 'Do you honestly think they intended to raise up the coastline like this? I don't think
they had any idea what would happen when they let their magic loose like that.'
'Well, we're all more humble now.' Kheda tore viciously at a particularly stubborn quill. 'And at least they saved us all from those dragons.'
'Do you think you might have been a little arrogant in setting your face against omens and portents?' Risala fiddled with the bandage around her broken wrist.
Kheda didn't answer, simply ripping more feathers from the partially denuded bird.
'When we get back to the Archipelago,' Risala persisted, 'will you at least look again at all the records, all the philosophers' writings, and listen to the epic poets who discuss their misgivings? You're hardly the first one to have doubts. Just to see if there's a chance you might be mistaken, before you throw all that away?'
Kheda cleared his throat. 'All right. I can do that much for you.'
When we get back to the Archipelago? If we ever get back to the Archipelago. That's an easy promise to make, because I don't see how we're ever going to get home.
'Kheda! Risala!'
The shout from the stern cabin made them both jump.
Risala looked at Kheda. 'Naldeth wants us.'
'Let's see why.' He swung his legs inboard. Traversing the slanted deck was a question of half-crawling, half-walking. The door to the stern cabin was hinged on the uphill side and awkward to manage. Splinters from the shattered ruby egg were driven deep into the wood.
Kheda forced a cheerful tone as he looked inside the cabin and flourished the dead bird. 'Fresh meat tonight, and I'll see if—'
He swallowed the rest of his words as he saw that the cabin wasn't just lit by the harsh sunlight filtering through the holes in the broken planking. A green glow
rose from the dented silver bowl that Velindre cradled, illuminating her face.
The magewoman sat cross-legged on the haphazard collection of clothing and bedding that they had piled in the angle of the sloping deck and the tilted wooden wall to make a vaguely level surface for sleeping. Looking up, she smiled at Kheda. Where her face had been thin before, the magewoman was now positively gaunt and the green light made the bruises all down one cheek look black against her pallor.
'How far can you scry?' Kheda tossed the dead bird back out onto the deck and stepped into the cabin. Risala followed him, her face alive with curiosity.
'So far I've seen that our friends in the village over on that higher ground escaped the worst of it.' Velindre sounded weary yet exultant.
'Some of their warriors have even made their way home.' There was no mistaking Naldeth's guilty relief. He still looked as exhausted as Velindre. His tan had faded to an unhealthy sallow and deep lines were now fixed between his brows and either side of his mouth. The blood staining his eyes had decayed to ghastly yellow and purple.
Kheda sneaked a discreet look at the young wizard's stump. The convulsions that had racked Naldeth during the mountains' eruptions had left his metal leg a misshapen ruin. As the mage had lain unconscious, Kheda had forced himself to see what had happened to his bleeding thigh. Relieved to find metal and flesh separate once more, he had forced the contrivance off the blistered stump and thrown it into a corner. Naldeth hadn't spoken of it since recovering his senses. Nor had he allowed Kheda to re-dress his broken scars.
At least there's no sign of suppuration, and if the flesh was rotting, we 'd all smell it in here.
Then he realised that the young mage's hands were
clasping his remaining knee. He had discarded all the splints and bandages Kheda had used to painstakingly reconstruct his broken bones.
'Naldeth, your hands,' the warlord said, astounded.
The young mage looked down and flexed his fingers, wincing. The torn flesh was still thickly scabbed and odd lumps bulged beneath the skin. 'I thought I had better make use of that black dragon's bone magic,' he said, swallowing hard. 'If my hands don't mend sufficiently to be useful, I really will be a cripple for the rest of my life.'
So such knowledge has its uses, however vile the uses that cloaked wizard might have put it to.
'Indeed.' Kheda kept his voice neutral.
'What have you seen?' Risala peered into the ensorcelled bowl.
'Rather more pertinent is what we haven't seen,' Velindre said slowly. 'We've seen no wild wizards working any magic to help the people or to help themselves. Some villages have gathered up their dead, but there's no sign that any dragon has been tempted to dine.'
'Neither of us have had any sense of a dragon within miles of here.' Naldeth gazed inland as if he could see through the splintered planks. 'And there's a warlord's ransom in rubies studding the deck. That would surely have drawn any beast attuned to fire.'
'I think we did it.' Velindre broke into a coughing fit that left her wheezing painfully.
The confusion plaguing Kheda resolved itself into one simple question. 'What exactly did you do?'
'We poisoned the well.' Velindre's smile was as cheerful as a death's-head rictus. 'That's another respected tactic in Aldabreshin warfare, according to what I heard as I sailed the Archipelago, one of the best ways to end a fight quickly.'
'We realised we couldn't beat the dragons.' Naldeth
shuddered. 'We must have been mad to think we ever stood a chance. We couldn't match them without destroying ourselves.'
'They were drawing on the elemental confluences that underpin this place.' Velindre gazed around as if she too could see through the broken hull of the Zaise. 'Or used to underpin it, I should say.'
'But what did you do?' Risala asked again.
'There was a degree of instability already inherent in the elements,' Naldeth said briskly. 'Water was seeping into the fissures in the sea bed, reaching all the way to the point where the fire came up out of the earth into the mountains. The pressures would have built up to an eruption long since if the dragons and the wild mages hadn't been drawing the elemental potential away with their wizardry, crude as it was. We simply accelerated events.'
Kheda wasn't wholly sure what the wizard was talking about but he knew self-justification when he heard it.
'Perhaps,' Velindre said dryly. 'The crucial thing was that we could use that ruby to work nexus magic. Between us we could draw all four elements together. Only there was no point in trying to use that quintessence against the dragons.'
'So we turned it against the instabilities in the elemental confluences and tipped the whole balance.' Naldeth rubbed a hand over his unkempt beard. 'I have to say, I wasn't expecting quite such dramatic results,' he added, contrite.
As Risala tucked herself under his arm, Kheda groped for understanding. 'How did this poison the elements?'
'They're all running into each other at the moment.' As Velindre looked up, the emerald light in the water dulled. 'Like dyestuffs bleeding into each other in cheap cloth.
Any dragon with any sense will have gone in search
of a purer, stronger elemental focus. All this confusion will repel them.'
'None of these wild wizards will have a chance of working their magic' Satisfaction warred with apprehension in Naldeth's words. 'It's proved nigh on impossible for us these past few days and we're used to working complex wizardry. These wild mages only know how to draw on a single element and their spells are little more than pure instinct.'
'I think we've both learned that all the strictures and warnings about working nexus magic are more than valid, certainly without a full quartet of mages.' Velindre looked down at the silver bowl, frowned, and the radiance rallied.
'I thought I had burned out my own affinity,' Naldeth said, voice hollow.
Velindre shivered with sympathy. 'This was ten times worse than that potion you fed me and Dev, Kheda.' She closed her eyes, bloodless lips pressed tight together.
'But as you can see, it was just a matter of time.' Naldeth rubbed at the crease between his brows with the ball of his thumb 'We still have our affinities.'
'What do you think you can do?' Kheda asked carefully. 'Without exhausting yourselves. You mustn't risk overtaxing yourselves.'
'Dev told us how dangerous that could be,' Risala agreed anxiously.
'Don't you want to know if we can get us all home?' Naldeth's smile was unnerving in the eerie light.
'That's not my only concern,' Kheda said frankly, 'but yes, since you mention it.'
'Haven't we done all we came here to do,' Risala demanded, 'and more?'
'Rather more than we intended,' commented Velindre sardonically. 'I don't know if I can work a translocation
over such a distance,' she went on, abruptly serious. 'Not until I have some better understanding of the elemental changes we've wrought around here.'
'We can give you all the time you need. The Zaise isn't going anywhere and we've seen no sign of savages making their way in this direction.' Kheda returned Risala's supportive hug that inevitably found some of his bruised ribs. 'I'd be grateful, though, when you think you're strong enough, if you could try to see what's happening in Chazen.'
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