“Many of you may die,” she said, “but you will be remembered, for you will help stop the sullying of the soil by those who do not respect the trees. And where would you be without those branches that you call your home? If this is allowed to happen it will be but the start of a world of stumps, where none are shielded from the cruelty of the sun.”
The birds hopped and flapped in agreement, for some of them had seen the felling of trees by the Tibin in the north-west, which then became great contraptions, where no bird was welcome. Many flocks were made homeless, engendering a deep hatred in the birds, who kept grudges almost as well as their oaths. The Ferian’s dislike for the endless noise of the Tibin, which disturbed nature and shook the forests, was one of the key elements of the feathered allegiance.
“Harry them,” Elithéa said. “Hound them. Hunt them and hinder them, until they are whittled down to nothing—to little tree stumps of their own.”
And so the flocks regrouped, and their number swelled as the message got out to their cousins across the land. The snow still cascaded down, but now a great blanket of black swept through it, and if the snow would not put an end to those they hunted, then they would smother them.
* * *
But this time Thalla was ready. She felt a heat in the core of her being, like a candle that had just been lit, and she struggled to keep her concentration, to increase the flame without burning in the process. The weather did not help, for it tugged and threw her hair, and it blew a chill into her face and grit into her eyes, like some playful force intent on taunting her, hoping to distract her, or some more powerful agency that did not like her game of fire.
Ifferon and Délin sat far away, at Thalla’s instructions, Délin shielding Théos from a snow he needed no protection from. She could feel them watching her, could sense their worry, and this proved another distraction. Her mind was already straining, and the flame began to flicker.
Then the army of the skies came, blotting out much of the light as they swooped down like a veil upon the head of the mountain. The wind sang to their descent, and the flock became a choir of squeals and squawks. Yet the din proved no distraction, instead fuelling Thalla’s concentration, for now she had something to focus on, a place to vent her anger.
As the birds came in, time seemed to slow, and Thalla found that little thread within her that connected her to the great tapestry of magic that had been woven since the god Aelor graced the world. She followed it in her mind, and as she did she found that the thread had set alight, so that a flame was also following her. She kept her cool and focused on where the thread would lead, until finally she could see it connecting to a bird mere inches from her face, claws at the ready. Time returned to normal now, but there was an explosion of fire around Thalla, felling a dozen birds and setting the wings of others alight. Then a hail of tiny sparks came from the sky, like miniature meteorites, and they struck many of the other birds still in the skies, a retribution of the heavens that was directed by Thalla’s will. The remaining birds quailed and panicked; some dived into the snow to douse their burning feathers, while others turned and fled as if the sky were no longer their home.
But there was a price for this victory. When the assailants had vanished, dead or fleeing, Thalla no longer had a direction to cast the fire, nowhere to follow the thread. She had pursued them through this link of concentration, but so too had the fire pursued her, had hunted her through the alleyways of the mind—and now it caught her and set her body ablaze.
Ifferon and Délin raced to her and rolled her through the snow until finally the fire was out. But it had done its damage. Burns marked the right side of her face and shoulder, and her hair there was singed. Her right hand was also marred, though less badly, and half her robe had burned to a crisp, the edges smoking like the remnants of a campfire.
Délin shook his head. The look in his eyes was enough to tell Thalla of her scars, though the shock numbed her. “So there is a price,” Délin said, and his voice was mournful, a ballad of blame aimed at his own ears. Thalla wanted to reassure him, but the pang in her face was a constant reminder of her own hurt, tearing her concentration back to the price, back to the pain.
“Yes, there is a price,” came a voice, a parrot of the knight. “There is always a price, a penalty to be paid. You take a loan of life, but always you must pay the debt. So you see why I must collect what is owed, ere you cheat another of their tithing.”
Then Elithéa stepped into view, holding up the branch she had taken from Idor-Hol, like a trophy of her battle there. Her army was gone, but it had served its purpose. It had slowed them down. The hunt was up. The chase was over. The prey sat wounded—waiting for the kill.
IV – THE AID OF ALIMROR
The battle began with a bellow, for Elithéa roared and raced towards them, the snow flailing in her footfalls, her staff raised high like the invocation of ancient powers.
Délin placed Théos gently on the snow, and the motion contrasted sharply with the unleashing of his two-handed sword. The ring of steel echoed across the mountain, the knight’s own battle cry.
They clashed like crashing waves, and Délin’s sword would have chopped the staff in two were it not for the hardened lowal tree, which could stay the blades of many. They stood like two opposing mountains, sword against staff, pressing against each other and digging their feet into the ground, digging trenches in the snow.
Délin’s strength was too much for Elithéa, however, and he began to push her back, her feet sliding in the snow. Then she stopped pressing back and slipped to the ground. Délin stumbled forward from his own force, and she tripped him as she lay.
She clambered to her feet, but Ifferon stood forth, holding the half-burned scroll before her. “Dehilasü baeos!” he cried, and the armour of Telm descended from the sky in a shimmer of light, surrounding him and making him appear taller and more powerful than before.
But Elithéa did not cower like the Molokrán. “I am no Shadowspirit,” she said. “Telm does not frighten me.”
“No,” Délin said, standing up behind her. “But this does.” And he grabbed the acorn pouch from her belt. As she turned to him in horror, he struck her in the face with the pommel of his sword, knocking her to the ground. “Yield!” he shouted.
“You know I can’t,” she said, wiping the blood from her nose. “You know I must stop you ruining the child’s second life, just like mine is ruined. If you knew how sacred these are to us, you would not taunt me with it.”
“It is the only thing that will stop you,” he said. “Except death, which I have no desire to grant you. This is your weakness. Now yield!”
“Everyone has a weakness,” she said, and she turned her gaze away from them. Bemused, they looked in the direction she was staring, and a horror of their own nested in their hearts. Théos lay mere feet away, and upon his chest sat a large hawk, its talons digging into the boy’s clothes, its beak hovering dangerously close to his face.
“You might try to raise him,” Elithéa said, “but the Al-Ferian’s defilements will not work if a part of the body is missing. And even if it did, what good is he without his eyes?”
“Send the bird away!” Délin cried. “Send it away or I will destroy your acorn.”
“It’s already ruined,” she said. “That was Aralus’ gift to me.”
“Then do not ruin the boy,” Ifferon said. “Do not mar his body.”
“His body is only a shadow of his real self, his tree,” she replied. “You do not see it. You do not understand, and I have been a fool to think that you, Ifferon, you of all people, finally knew what it meant to be Ferian. His body is just a shell that houses the seeds of his being. He could lose all his limbs, could be mangled in form, and that would not matter if his acorn remained intact, if it could be planted to grow a beautiful tree. That is why all of you, Man, Aelora, Taarí, and Tibin, are dead to us, because you think life is in the body. But it is not. You do not understand. You will never understand. And you might thi
nk me some new enemy, yet I only try to stop you making a terrible mistake. I only try to preserve the true life of the boy.”
“But what about the god?” Ifferon asked. “What about Corrias?”
“If he is dead, then he is dead,” she replied. “I do not understand the ways of the Céalari, but if Éala chose to incarnate in the body of an Al-Ferian, then surely he chose this so that when he died he could live the most splendid life of a tree. Who would not want that?”
“Not me,” Thalla said, and she covered her face. “I would rather make the trip to Halés and enter the halls of my ancestors.”
“And be closer to Agon?” Elithéa asked. “You hide your scars, because you think they matter. They do not. Herr’Don fled from our group because of his wounds, because he thought he was less of a warrior with them. None of you understand.”
The hawk squawked and flapped its wings, dangling its beak above the boy’s right eye, and then his left.
“Send the bird away,” Délin said. “We may not understand your race, but you do not understand honour, and that is a thing that defies blood.”
“I think your honour is dying,” Elithéa said. “When you steal my acorn and threaten to defile my second life.”
“Please, Elithéa,” Délin said. “You know I wish you no harm. Please just send the bird away.”
“It is the only way to stop you now,” she said. “It has to feed.” She turned and whistled to the hawk, which glared at the others and flapped its wings again. It reared its head, and all knew that they could not reach it in time before it mauled the boy.
“No!” Délin cried, and he charged towards it, dropping Elithéa’s acorn in the snow, where she grasped it and held it close. The knight dived towards the hawk, towards the boy, but the beak dived at the child’s face, and it seemed to all that it moved more quickly.
Suddenly an arrow shot across the snow, striking the hawk before it could prod at the eyes of the child. It screeched, stumbled on the boy’s chest, and then collapsed upon him. Then another arrow came hurtling towards the group, hitting Elithéa in the shoulder. She screamed and stumbled like the bird, falling to her knees and almost dropping her acorn from her hands.
A small band of Al-Ferian strolled through the snow towards them, one holding a bow at the ready, and they were led by a tall, broad man with dark weathered skin, who almost looked like an oak. The illusion was furthered by the giant banner he carried, the staff made of branches, and the cloth made of leaves. He stepped forward and planted it in the snow, like a declaration of spring at the waning days of winter.
“She speaks little of the body,” he shouted, and the leaves of the banner rustled from the sound. “Yet she still squeals the same as any other when hurt.”
They were golden brown of skin, like an autumn leaf, and their colour made Théos’ pale complexion, paler now than ever in death, look even more at odds, despite his Al-Ferian ancestry. Ifferon wondered if his parents knew immediately when he was born that he was different.
Délin turned to the Al-Ferian, his sword upraised. “Who are you?”
“We are the welcomers of the woods,” he said. “We are the Al-Ferian of Alimror. I am Rúathar, leader of my people, and head of this search party. One of many we sent out, and, I am glad to say, the one that has finally been successful.”
“Successful at what?” Délin asked. He did not lower his sword.
“Finding our child,” Rúathar said. Everyone looked to Théos now, with the dead hawk upon his chest, like a stuffed toy for a boy only sleeping.
“He is with us,” Délin said sternly.
“Yes,” Rúathar said, “but not your child. Yet do not worry. We do not share the feelings of our sisters in Féthal. We will do all we can to restore Théos back to life. We have already begun the preparations, for our search parties may not have returned, but the rumours have.”
“So it is possible?” Délin asked, lowering his sword.
“Yes,” the Al-Ferian said. “Though it is difficult and takes much time. You are lucky you travelled this way, for the weather might not be welcoming, but it is less of an enemy than what has been hounding the other paths. Indeed, you are lucky in many ways.”
“Yes,” Ifferon admitted. “We are lucky you came here.”
“No,” the Al-Ferian said. “You are lucky we brought a bow. We do not normally use them. Yet foresight made us bring one on this expedition. We are all lucky, because I do not think we would have killed the bird in time without it.”
“Then someone or something is on our side,” Ifferon said, and he noticed the relief in his voice. Finally, against all those enemies he knew of, and those he knew had yet to surface, there were some whom he could call allies, and perhaps the tides of luck were changing.
Délin was less convinced. “I would have stopped the hawk.”
Rúathar glanced at him. “You might stop many great foes, knight, but sometimes there is an urgency that heavy armour does not suit. But let us consider the greatest luck of all, for without Théos we would have lost a great weapon.”
“A child,” Délin corrected. “Not a weapon.”
“See how they think of those of Low Age,” Elithéa said. “You might suspect I have no honour, Délin, but now you know for certain that they never had any.”
“Always trying to start a scuffle,” Rúathar said. “The Ferian speak about protecting the forest, but they do not know the serenity of the trees.”
Elithéa snapped the arrow that still stuck out of her shoulder and held up the broken half in her hand. “This is not serenity,” she said.
“Bind her,” Rúathar said. “And gag her too, or she will have to remove many more arrows.”
The accompanying Al-Ferian surrounded her, blocking her escape. Several of them advanced with ropes, but she pushed them back, until finally they struck her many times with their staves and tied her when she was breathless—yet not before they were also battered.
“This is not over,” she panted. “You will have to kill me ere I tire of foiling your evil schemes.”
“Do not worry, Ferian,” Rúathar said, and he looked at her with the eyes of oaks that have faced a hurricane. “We have no qualm with that.”
Finally they tied a cloth around her mouth, and some left with bite marks on their fingers, scars as ferocious as any wounds of war. They dragged her to her feet and pulled her along, with four guards holding the ropes at a distance, in case she tried to lash out at them again.
“Now we make for Alimror,” Rúathar said. “But first I think you are in need of some warmth, for there is little point in marching when the cold of the White Mountains lives in your limbs. We brought many supplies for our search, for we expected to have to traverse the fullness of these peaks. Mathal, bring some fur for our guests. Thúalim, begin a fire.”
Mathal was a wiry woman, with long limbs and fingers, and she might have been as tall as Rúathar, but she stooped like a willow tree. Perhaps this was from all the things she was bidden to carry here and there, even though she looked as though she were not strong enough for it. Yet she hauled a great many skins and furs from the sled and separated them into several piles.
Thalla was the first to grab one of the furs, for she was not used to the cold, and she felt it more now that her robe was damaged. Ifferon thought also that she took it to hide her scars, for she held it around both her head and her body, until it looked like she were some furry beast. Ifferon took a fur and wrapped himself in it tightly, but he left his head exposed, where the snowflakes had lodged in the wisps of hair that once were stubble. He knew the cold well, for Larksong sat in the face of the icy gales that came down from Caelün, and his head was always exposed to the weather, even in the damp, cold cell of the monastery, where the cracks of the walls were like little windows of their own. Délin wrapped Théos in a fur coat before he tended to himself, and he did not remove his armour first, but simply cast the fur about him like a cloak. Ifferon wondered if the knight had many layers of
fine clothing beneath the metal plates, or if perhaps the armour shielded from the cold, or if honour was a fire enough to warm him in the bitterness of night.
Thúalim was slim and slender, fair and young in face, and delicate and graceful in his stance and form. Even as he bent down to light a fire with the wood other Al-Ferian brought to him from the sled, he had a certain dignity in his kneel, as if he were a willing prince working in service of an even more royal house. It was a poise that few kings had, the elegance of elm.
The group huddled around the fire, which burst into being as if from the scarred hands of Thalla, for Thúalim did not struggle with twig and flint like Ifferon might. He whispered to the wood, as if he were nursing it to sleep, so that it would not feel the fire that would ignite upon its body. The flames appeared like the invocation of a spirit, and Thúalim sat at the head of the fire, whispering now and then, perhaps some words of comfort as the wood began to stir from its slumber.
None of the Al-Ferian bar Rúathar joined them, despite many of them shivering near the sled.
“I’ve heard of you, Trueblade,” Rúathar said at last, nodding to Délin. “And you,” he said, turning his old eyes upon Ifferon. “But who is the girl who hides beneath the blankets?”
“Thalla,” she said, her voice muffled by the fur.
“Your wounds look new,” he replied. “Will you let our healers tend to them before they worsen? The cold might freeze them here, but when you enter the warmth beneath the canopy of Alimror they will fester.”
“I just want to be alone,” she said.
“Please, Thalla,” Délin said. “You have suffered much to aid us thus far. Please let them help you now. There is nothing I can do, though I should have stopped you risking your life, but the Al-Ferian know herbs like no other.”
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