Summon Your Dragons
Page 31
He stretched out his hand towards it.
“No!” Grath shouted, pulling him back and bringing down his sword in a swift movement that sliced the coils into twitching, bleeding segments. Azkun felt nothing as the creature died. It was like the fish Althak had caught at the lake, there was no darkness for him.
“I'm sorry, Azkun. That's a snake, a viper. They bite and their bite is deadly. We have this kind on the other side of the mountains, although not as many as I've seen here. That's why the horse shied. He knows.”
“I thought it was a small dragon,” said Azkun in a quiet voice.
“It wasn't,” said Menish behind him, laying a hand on his shoulder.
“No, no it was not. I felt nothing when it died. I think I would have, surely, if a dragon had died. Is it some mockery of the dragons?”
“Perhaps. It's just an animal.”
They travelled on more warily after that. Grath kept a close eye on the road in front of them and his hand on his sword hilt.
Although the days were evil the nights were a torment. They could not leave the road so they camped on it where they stopped. Firewood was not difficult to gather from the trees that overhung the road, but their fires filled the night with furtive rustlings and thousands of eyes. They set watches at night, something they had not felt the need of before, and hoped that the tales of marsh monsters were false.
For the most part the road was in excellent condition. Moss grew on the great flagstones, of course, and branches from the overhanging trees lay across it at times. But there were no serious obstacles.
On the third day into Gashan, however, a large tree had collapsed across the causeway. It was breast high and tufted with epiphytes and moss. On one side of the causeway it was a thick trunk, on the other side it split into narrower branches.
“Careful,” said Grath, pointing at a red and gold stripe sliding into a gap in the branches.
Grath carried a small axe for cutting firewood and he began to use it on the smaller branches. It was hard work and Althak took a turn when Grath started cursing at the slow progress. Hrangil lit a fire and passed around some of the dried meat they carried.
Between them Grath and Althak hacked through several limbs and pushed them off into the swamp where they sank slowly, releasing more of the foul smell.
They were working on the fifth limb, the thickest one and they had left it until last when it happened.
Grath had just handed Althak the axe and stepped back from the tree, his back to the edge of the causeway when the mire erupted behind him. A strange mass of weeds and dripping slime with a gaping mouth and two great tusks reared above them.
The horses, left unhobbled for there seemed nowhere for them to go, screamed in fright and ran. Something long and jointed, like a great finger wrapped itself around Grath even as he tried to draw his sword. Azkun felt a tug at his boot, toppling him to the ground. One finger was around his leg, another was reaching for his arm as he tried to push it off.
“Get off him!” shouted Hrangil as he drew his sword and hacked at the things. Azkun felt stabs of pain as they were sliced through and left twitching on the causeway. But he felt Grath's terror more. More and more fingers had coiled around the struggling Grath and lifted him into the air while Hrangil stood over Azkun hacking and slashing as more fingers came at both of them.
It had all happened so quickly that only now did Menish and Althak have time to draw swords and rush to Grath's aid. Althak, with the longest reach, chopped at the fingers that held Grath while Menish used his sword like a scythe to cut away the fingers reaching for Althak.
Azkun fumbled for the sword they had given him and began to help Hrangil hack at more and more fingers that slid over the causeway edge. And every time he cut one it was like cutting off his own finger.
Grath gave a final anguished cry and, in spite of Althak's efforts, vanished into the gaping hole that was the creature's mouth. Darkness engulfed Azkun for a moment as he felt Grath's body crushed.
Sometime in their struggle he felt a stab of pain in his side that made him double over. He did not dare look at himself but carried on slashing, clutching a wetness where he still felt agony.
It seemed like hours, but the thing gave up eventually and retreated back into the mire. It sank under the mud, gurgling and howling and making sounds that made them think of a man in torment. Grath.
Azkun had felt Grath's death. This was only the creature itself. But still Azkun felt torment. He looked at the place where he felt pain, expecting to see blood, but there was none. Beside him Menish and Althak stood over Hrangil who lay on the causeway amid the remains of the fingers. One of them twitched by the old man's head and Althak flung it away in disgust. Hrangil's tunic was crimson with blood. A small but ugly wound in his side ran redly onto the causeway stones.
Menish looked at Azkun, his face grey. He caught his hand with both his own. They felt cold and clammy. The King’s lips moved soundlessly as if he could not speak the words he wanted to.
“Azkun, he's dying. One of the tusks, it pierced him. Save him.”
Azkun knelt beside Hrangil, his knees sinking into the mud. Hrangil’s pain was his own. He could feel it in his own side. Blood pouring away. He placed his hand over the wound.
“I can do nothing. It is the dragons.”
Hrangil moaned.
“I don't care about your dragons! You healed a man in Atonir. Hrangil just saved your life. Do something!”
Hrangil’s torment writhed in Azkun’s guts. The blood still ran. There was only torment. He could not shut it out. He tried. He held the wound closed tightly, but blood seeped between his fingers. He called on the dragons, he willed Hrangil to live. But the pain was still there, and the blood still ran. It was like a lake around them now.
As he knelt beside him Hrangil opened his eyes and looked at him. His lips moved through teeth clenched against pain. He spoke so quietly that Azkun did not know if the others could hear.
“This is my death, I know it. I go to Aton knowing I have tried to serve him well. I'm ready but for one thing.” He winced with the effort of speech and Azkun felt his pain. “You've never told me, but I have believed. I would dearly love to hear it from your own lips. You are really Gilish, aren't you?”
Azkun had nothing else to give him. No healing, although Hrangil had saved him.
“Yes, yes. I am Gilish.”
Hrangil let out a sigh and let go of his consciousness.
He did not die quickly, but he did not reawaken. Azkun was withered with agony and darkness and his own lie when Menish and Althak laid Hrangil at last on a pile of wood they had made on the causeway and lit it. Menish spoke the words of sending and praised Hrangil’s valour and faith. Althak also spoke of him, for he had known him most of his life. Althak wept as he spoke and Azkun was surprised, for he had thought the Vorthenki did not like Hrangil much. They turned expectantly to Azkun. At first he shook his head. What could he say of the man who had died because he could not save him? But because they wanted him to he thanked the shade of Hrangil for his own life and wished him peace. Then he lay down on the road and wept.
It was not until next morning they moved on. The night was spent beside the embers of Hrangil’s pyre listening to the furtive noises in the shadows and hoping that the thing from the marsh would not return. Gurgles from the mud startled them but it did not reappear.
In the confusion of the attack the horses had bolted with most of their supplies. Althak carried a small pack that contained food and a little water but, not knowing how long it would have to last, they did not eat the next day. Menish suggested they go no further, the expedition had failed. If they made their way back along the causeway they would find the horses in a few days and then return home in relative comfort. But Althak said that he was willing to continue. They still had not seen a Gashan, and they should try and find the city. Azkun said that he, too, was willing to go on, otherwise Hrangil and Grath had died for nothing. So they went on.
The lack of food and water was no hardship to Azkun, but marching on foot was weary. It was the next day that they met their second disaster.
Menish had relied heavily on Grath’s woodcraft. It was he who had known which snakes were poisonous and which were harmless, and it was he who had kept a constant watch for other dangers. None of them noticed anything strange about a tangle of branches above the causeway as they passed under it.
Azkun let out a scream, clawing something off his face. An instant later Althak cried out. Only Menish had the presence of mind to throw himself to one side as a dark, wriggling thing with many legs dropped down towards him.
“Look out, there are more of them,” he shouted as others dropped. Azkun was still clawing his face and Althak swatted at his arm as he lurched forward.
A few yards on they turned and looked back at the grotesque pile of wriggling bodies and legs that covered the causeway where they had stood. They were long things, like bits of rope, with stubby legs and they writhed over each other like snakes. Centipedes. Menish had seen such things in his own land, but never as large as these.
“Did they bite? Did either of you feel a bite?”
Both Azkun and Althak nodded grimly. Althak had been bitten on the wrist and two tiny puncture wounds welled blood. Azkun’s wounds were on his cheek.
Menish did not pause. He ripped the sleeve of his tunic and bound it around Althak’s wrist, placing the knot so that it pressed against the artery. For Azkun he could do nothing.
“I'm sorry,” he said. “I can't bind it off from your face.” Then he added bitterly when he remembered Hrangil, “Perhaps now you'll call on your dragons.”
Azkun said nothing, but he felt his cheek where the bite had begun to sting.
That afternoon they met their first Gashan.
It was late in the day, the sun was blocked by the trees which cast gloomy shadows across their path. Soon it would be unwise to continue, for they would not be able to watch for more centipede nests.
Menish was about to suggest they stop for the night when Althak saw something ahead on the road. Azkun was filled with a sudden disquiet, like nausea, as they made their way forward to the odd huddle of shadows.
The gloom was such that only when they reached it did they see what it was. A tall stake had been driven into the causeway, its wood blackened and grimed with age. Tied to it by one wrist was a Gashan, the other wrist dripped darkly in the shadows. He was naked. At his feet lay a trampled mess of old bones, waiting for his own to join them.
Azkun felt death here. The Gashan was only just alive. He hung from his tied wrist limply. Azkun felt his own wrist pricking with empathy, his own blood flowed thinly in his veins and he felt the weak pain of the dying man.
The Gashan stirred as they approached. His eyes opened, half focused and listless as he moved his head to survey them. Azkun’s eyes met his and he drew back in horror.
“No!” he cried and his cry degenerated into an animal scream. The Gashan’s mind, though dying, was filled with black malice. Azkun saw it all in an instant. Every fibre of the Gashan, from his bound wrist to the blood pooled at his feet, was writhing with hatred. If they released him he would spend his last strength trying to kill them. Even bound his malice stung Azkun like acid. He tried to shut out the mind of the man, surely he was just a man, a dying man. He looked a little like Menish, though younger and he wore no ponytail. But he could not shut it out. The Gashan seemed to know what he was doing to Azkun, a weak grin tugged at the corners of his mouth and more malice flooded into Azkun. It felt like fire in his veins and, even worse, it ate at his own mind. The Gashan’s thoughts of murder and death became his own. The smell of blood and slaughter became sweet to him. The darkness entered his soul. A tiny corner of his mind that still shouted ‘no’ realised that this was what the Gashan wanted. His hands clutched inexpertly at the dagger at his side, the dagger Omoth had given him when he had told Omoth not to kill, and he threw himself at the Gashan’s throat.
When Menish and Althak finally pulled him away from the body of the Gashan he had opened the man’s throat and covered them both in blood. The Gashan hung lifelessly on the stake. Azkun had killed him.
He had tasted blood and death at his own hand, or the hand of the man he had killed, and the evil lurked on in his mind. He abhorred his deed, he who had refused to eat flesh and had despised those who did. But a part of him, a dark, evil corner of his mind, gibbered gleefully and still it lusted for more. Azkun saw the evil in himself and recognised it. He had seen it so many times in others, and now it lurked in his own mind like a tiny piece of the Gashan he had killed. And he could not drive it out.
In the awful moments after Althak and Menish had dragged him away from the corpse he wanted to run from himself. He struggled, trying to tear himself free. He wanted to throw himself to the creature in the marsh to destroy the evil he was. In the struggle Althak gripped his wrist like a vice and the knife clattered to the stone at his feet. He was grateful afterwards, he would have used the knife on his friends or himself if he had been able.
Althak held him still and Menish slapped his face, avoiding the centipede bite, until the madness left his eyes. When he was calm they led him away from the grisly scene and prepared their comfortless camp. No one spoke. Azkun could feel their questions, and their hesitancy to ask him. He could not bring himself to tell them how evil he was.
Menish checked their bites. Althak’s was dark and swelling with poison. It was giving him pain. Azkun’s was swelling only mildly. He saw Menish chew his lip worriedly as he examined it.
“The wound hasn't swelled, that's because the poison is spreading with nothing to stop it. Does it hurt?”
“No. It stings a little, that is all.”
“That's some comfort. I fear the worst. Such things are written of in the Gash-Tal. They're to be feared.”
“It does not matter.” He glanced over his shoulder. The stake was just visible in the shadows. “It is no more than I deserve.”
“Of course it matters!” Althak gripped him by his tunic under his throat. “Don't say that!”
“Why not? All I have seen and despised in you I find in myself.”
“By Kopth! We're talking about your death!” He glanced down at his wrist. “And possibly my own. How can you say it doesn't matter?”
“Do you think I do not know what death is?” Azkun shouted back into his face. “You have only seen men die. I have died with them. I know what I am saying. Did you not see what I just did back there? There is death inside me, an evil that the Gashan brought to life. I am no better than you are!”
“It's always dangerous to despise others,” said Menish. There was a firmness in his voice, as if he were trying to be sympathetic and yet trying to make Azkun see truth. “You killed a Gashan. I've killed them myself. They're evil. That one appeared near death anyway, but he had enough strength left to look at me with murder in his eyes. Perhaps you despise me, but I say you did no wrong.” He hesitated, about to ask a question but not knowing how.
“Why did I do it?” Azkun sighed. “You know I can see things that you cannot. I saw the Gashan. You only saw his eyes. I saw him. I became him. I had to stop him. Even if it meant,” he glanced over his shoulder. “Even if it meant that.”
Menish and Althak made a frugal meal of some of the dried meat and fruit from Althak’s pack, their first in two days. As usual Azkun did not eat, but he could no longer bring himself to condemn them for their need of food.
He too was a victim of corruption, and he was dying.
Chapter 25: The Eye of Duzral
The next day they moved even more apprehensively along the causeway. The dead Gashan might have been some kind of warning, he certainly indicated that they were approaching a place where the Gashan folk lived, possibly
even the city written of in the Gash-Tal.
Althak’s arm was swollen and painful. The skin around the bite was tight and black with poison, but Azkun’s condition seemed to have stabilised.
They had not been walking more than two hours when they heard a rumbling in the distance. It sounded like thunder at first but the sky was clear. As they drew closer they realised that it was the sound of great drums being hammered.
Around them the forest was becoming less swampy. The causeway was no longer a bridge over the marsh but a road across solid ground. The trees were less dense here, though the snakes were as plentiful as ever. Without the marsh they had nothing to fear from the thing that had killed Hrangil and Grath, but there were other things in the forest. Once Menish noticed a large cat-like creature sliding stealthily among the trees.
In spite of the protection it gave them they decided to leave the causeway. It was possible that the Gashans would have guards posted on it, and discovery would surely mean death. They made their way through the forest, keeping the causeway in sight and keeping a wary eye out for other dangers.
The city itself came upon them suddenly. They emerged from a dense part of the forest and found themselves beside a high stone wall that stretched away from them on either side. It was ancient and crumbling, and beyond it came the hammering of drums.
Menish thrust them back into the cover of the forest while he scanned the walls for guards. However, there were no Gashans in sight. They crept along the edge of the wall until they came to a place where it had crumbled away sufficiently for them to pass through.
“Be careful,” said Menish. “Evil things, snakes and the like, may lurk among the stones.”
Althak’s breath was labouring as they picked their way among the blocks of stone. They saw several brightly coloured snakes like the one Grath had killed sunning themselves on the stones, but they did not have to pass close to them.