Aenir

by Garth Nix

  "I have to find the Codex," he said aloud.

  Above him, Adras nodded his head, but did not stop soaking up water vapor. The desert had been hard on the Storm Shepherd. He had shrunk to three quarters his normal size in the dry air. Now he was intent on taking in as much water as possible, to last him till the cooler night.

  "It's better that Milla left," Tal added. He was looking at Adras, but he was really talking to himself. "It makes everything more… I don't know… straightforward. I mean, she didn't want to find the Codex, really. She just wanted to know about Aenir to tell that weird old woman."

  Adras stopped taking in water vapor long enough to burp. Then he started sucking again, his powerful breath twisting the water into vapor and up into his mouth.

  "Beautiful," said Tal. "You're a big help." Despite the heat, now at its most intense, Tal didn't want to wait. Every minute spent in the oasis was time lost. Anything could be happening while he sat around eating cakefruit. To Gref, or to his mother.

  Anything.

  "Come on," he said. But he had only gone a few stretches from the shade of the trees when the heat from the sand burnt through the soles of his shoes, sending him hopping and swearing back to the pool.

  "Too hot to travel," said Adras, yawning. "We should wait till it cools off."

  "I guess so," said Tal reluctantly. He inspected his boots. He hadn't noticed before, but the morning's trek through the strange desert had burned several holes through the hide. They were Icecarl boots, built for ice, not burning sands. "We'll have to make up the time tonight."

  Adras nodded.

  Tal put his back against one of the trees, looked up to make sure that no cakefruit was likely to fall on him, and closed his eyes. He wouldn't sleep, he vowed. He'd just think everything through. Finding the Codex was the first step, but there was a lot more to think about.

  "How do I find the Codex?" he mumbled to himself. Did he just keep on walking east till he fell over it?

  Tal knew it wouldn't be as easy as that. He would rest now and save his strength. Then he would walk all night. He'd make up the lost time. He had to.

  But the sun was very hot, even in the shade of the cakefruit trees, and Tal's thoughts drifted off into dreams.

  He slept, even when the breeze came up and cake-fruit dropped with soft plopping noises all around him.

  He slept on, even as something slithered down the trunk of the cakefruit tree above him. Something long and scaly, though very flat and thin. It had thousands of tiny hooked legs. They rippled under it, each hook digging out minute flecks of bark as it made its circular way down and around the trunk.

  It had two heads at the end of its ribbonlike body. They were of unequal sizes. The smaller head had a bulbous cluster of eight multifaceted eyes, and two jointed tendrils that quested ahead. The other head was twice as big. It was all mouth, currently shut.

  The thing seemed in no hurry. It moved steadily down, until it was right above Tal's sleeping head. The tendrils from its small head brushed his hair, and the eyes glittered as it measured up the Chosen boy.

  Then its mouth began to open. At first it didn't seem possible that it could open wide enough to do Tal any harm. But the lower section of the thing's head continued to open wider and wider, the mouth spreading back well past the second head, into the creature's body.

  It didn't have any teeth, but an ugly green spit began to drip from the back of its throat.

  The thing shifted a little to line Tal up better, and then slowly began to lower its jaws down over his head, as the green drool spread across his scalp.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Tal awoke to the sound of strange rumbling, and a sun that was low in the sky. He sat up a little straighter and scratched his head. Something sticky came off on his hand and Tal jerked his fingers back down to look.

  "Errrch!" he yelled, and stood up. Some disgusting tree sap or something had dropped on his head while he was asleep. He rushed over to the spring and washed his hand off, then stuck his head in and gave that a good wash as well.

  The level of the spring had sunk a good hand's breadth, and it was easy to see where it had gone, and where the strange rumbling sound was coming from. Adras was floating just above Tal's head, snoring. He had taken in so much water he was a fat butterball of a cloud, all fluffy white, without a streak of the lean, mean darkness of a storm.

  "Call yourself a Storm Shepherd!" said Tal, but he didn't say it too loud. He could hardly blame Adras for falling asleep. He was disgusted that he had himself, though they probably would not have been able to set out any earlier anyway.

  Mind you, he thought, it was lucky nothing happened. Aenir was not a world where it paid to sleep unguarded.

  He was just thinking that when he saw the hideous creature with two heads. It was on the ground only a few stretches away, wriggling toward him, a trail of the hideous green slime dribbling from its mouth.

  Tal raised his hand and focused on the Sunstone. He would blast it with a Red Ray of Fiery Destruction.

  The Sunstone flashed red and began to shine. But before the Red Ray was complete, Tal blinked and lowered his hand.

  The grotesque two-headed worm or snake or whatever it was had left a trail of its own bright saliva in particular patterns. It had scribed a whole series of characters onto the ground under the trees.

  Tal stared at the writing. At first he couldn't work it out. Then he realized that he was looking at everything upside down. So he walked around, taking care to give plenty of space to the two-headed snake, which was still writing.

  There was the letter C again, and an arrow pointing east. But there was also a picture of something. A key, Tal thought. And then several letters, which spelled out H-A-Z-R-O-R.

  "Who are you?" asked Tal, talking to the snake. "How do you communicate through creatures?"

  The snake twitched and began to drip another letter onto the ground. Tal walked a bit closer, keen to work out what the letter was going to be. It looked like the first part of a C.

  He was only a stretch away when there was a titanic explosion of air. Tal was thrown backward and a great spray of dirt shot into the sky, accompanied by pieces of two-headed snake.

  "I got it!" roared Adras, punching the air with one huge cloud-fist. "I've saved you!"

  Tal picked himself up and counted to ten. Adras was worse than Gref. At least Gref knew he was annoying when he interfered with whatever Tal was doing.

  "Why did you do that?" Tal asked slowly, when he could get the words out without screaming.

  "It was a Two-Headed Gulper," said Adras, as if that was explanation enough. "Lucky I was keeping an eye open."

  This was too much for Tal.

  "You were sound asleep, you idiot!" he shouted. "And it was writing me a message. A message from the Codex!"

  "It wasn't a Two-Headed Gulper?" asked Adras innocently.

  "Yes, it was," agreed Tal. "But it wasn't… I don't know… being one right at that second."

  "What have you done to your hair?" asked Adras, tilting his puffy head to one side as if he couldn't work it out.

  "What?" asked Tal. "What?" "Your hair," said Adras. "It's changed color."

  Tal forgot about telling the Storm Shepherd exactly how stupid he was and rushed over to the spring. But it was bubbling too much to be a useful mirror.

  "Green," added Adras. "In streaks."

  Tal touched his hair again. It seemed all right, but when he pulled out a few hairs they were bright green.

  As green as the saliva of the Two-Headed Gulper, he realized. It must have been dripping on his head, just before it was taken over or whatever the Codex did and made to write the message.

  He looked back at the tree where he'd been sleeping, and saw the pattern of the Gulper's clawed feet heading down, and a few patches of green on the bark just above where his head would have been.

  "I feel sick," he said suddenly.

  Adras watched in total
puzzlement as the boy staggered over to another tree and threw up. It seemed rather an excessive reaction just because his hair had changed color. Storm Shepherds changed color all the time.

  When Tal had stopped being sick, he turned back to Adras.

  "Adras," said Tal. "I think it's time we set down some rules. First of all, you must not go to sleep when I am asleep. You must keep watch."

  "But I feel sleepy when you're sleepy," answered Adras. "Because we share a bond."

  "I am the Chosen," ordered Tal. "You are my Spiritshadow. Or you will be. You must obey."

  "Why?" asked Adras. "Why shouldn't we work things out together?"

  Tal stared up at the sky. This was not how he'd imagined dealing with his own Spiritshadow.

  If only Milla hadn't interrupted him back at the Hill, he would have bound this hulking great creature properly. Now Tal had given away his shadow, instead of using it to secure absolute obedience.

  Adras mistook Tal's silence for some sort of sulk.

  "Well, if that's the way you want it," he said, "I'll sleep when you're awake. I'll sleep now."

  "No!" exclaimed Tal. "We need to keep moving. The sky is clear I'll be able to see well enough to find a path through the crystals."

  "But where?" asked Adras. "To find Odris?"

  "No!" said Tal. "We've been over that. The Codex at least I think it's the Codex - has sent me another message."

  He frowned, thinking about the arrow, and the pictures of the key and the letters that spelled out "Hazror."

  "We will head east, and there is somewhere called Hazror, where we will look for a key," Tal announced confidently. It was important to sound in charge in front of a wayward servant. He'd learned that as a child, instructing Underfolk.

  He didn't feel confident, though. What if he'd got the message totally wrong?

  "Hazror?" asked Adras. "Haze-roar?"

  "Yes," said Tal. "Do you know anything about it?"

  "I know something about a creature called Hazror," said Adras. His chest turned dark and stormy and lightning flashed at his fingertips. "Enough to know that we don't want to go anywhere near him."

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  "no," said Milla, after she considered what Odris had said, and the Face's plea for freedom. "If Danir did indeed bind you here, it is not for me to free you."

  The Face snarled at this answer. Only the spell that bound it in place and the pact of the riddle game prevented it from attacking Milla.

  "But I will report what you have told me to the Crones," Milla added. "I do not think Danir would want any living thing fixed in one place for so long."

  "Tell the Crones!" spat the Face, a spray of cold water splashing over Milla. "What use is that to me?"

  "It may be, one day," said Milla calmly. "Now you must release me. I have answered three riddles."

  "The third was not a riddle," grumbled the Face. "I will ask another. Riddle the"

  It stopped, its tongue suddenly frosted, frozen in place. Its eyes rolled and its cheeks swelled as it tried to continue speaking, but the frost held it fast.

  Milla looked down and saw that the thin trickle of water that held her foot was frozen. Experimentally, she tried to shift her leg. The ice cracked and broke.

  She tried to move her hand. The water droplets there were now flecks of ice, and they fell off.

  She was free!

  She ran around the pool and away. Odris cruised above her, calling back toward the Face.

  "Hah! That's what you get when you try and cheat on the riddle game!" the Storm Shepherd shouted.

  Milla and Odris were a hundred stretches away when the Face's tongue unfroze. They heard its shout behind them, plaintive and sad.

  "Remember! Speak to your Crones! Free me!"

  They heard the Face calling for almost an hour after that, its voice fading as the distance between them slowly increased.

  The grassland gave way to a sparse forest of gray, sick-looking trees. After examining them carefully to make sure they were not likely to move or attack her, Milla cut several branches and sharpened the ends into points to create makeshift spears. They did not throw well, but they were serviceable. She also picked up several smooth stones, again checking them carefully to make sure they were not eggs or something worse.

  Odris watched from overhead without comment. Milla was tempted to ask the Storm Shepherd about the trees and the stones, but she chose not to. She must not become dependent on the creature, the Icecarl told herself.

  Milla walked through the forest for several hours. After a while the ground started to rise. It was quite gradual, but even so it placed an extra strain on her bruised ankles and knees. So she told Odris to pick her up again, to fly for a while.

  "I'm too tired," said Odris. "Besides, why should I carry you? You haven't been nice to me at all."

  "I didn't ask you to eat my shadow," said Milla. "Give it back and I will go on alone."

  "I didn't eat it. I'm sharing it. And I can't give it back."

  "Tell me. What was the Face talking about back there? What war between two worlds?"

  "Will you be nice to me if I tell you?"

  "Shield Maidens do not barter favors." Milla started walking again.

  "Oh, all right, I'll tell you anyway," said Odris. "The war was between the world you come from and Aenir. I don't know much about it, really, because I'm only two thousand years old and it happened just before I was created. Nearly every Aeniran who was alive back then suffered the Forgetting, so they couldn't tell me what happened either. I've just picked up pieces of the story here and there."

  Two thousand years, thought Milla. A year was a circling, she knew, or close enough. She silently counted through the generations, back to Danir. It did add up. Danir would have been living roughly two thousand years ago. But she was an Icecarl ancestor, not one of the Chosen.

  "The Face spoke of the Veil being made at the same time as the Forgetting," said Milla. She'd stopped walking, intent on the questions she was asking. "Who made the Veil? And who… how… was the Forgetting done?"

  "I'm not really sure," replied Odris. Her lightning-eyes were very bright she was clearly interested in this subject. "The people on your world - the ones that now call themselves the Chosen, though they had a different name then made the Veil to keep Aeniran creatures out of your world. Because we have always become shadows in your world, blocking the sun was the ultimate defense. However, the Veil was only part of the plan, which was carried out by two different sorts of Chosen. The first kind created the Veil. The second kind cast the Forgetting and bound almost every Aeniran in place while we were weak and powerless from the Forgetting. These Chosen bound everyone, whether we'd been shadows in your world or not. Danir was one of this second sort of Chosen, I'm sure."

  "But what happened to them?" asked Milla. "The ones who did the Forgetting and the Binding?"

  "When the job was done, they left Aenir and went back to your world," said Odris. "For a long time after that everyone on Aenir was stuck within their bounds. You know, in a cave, or on a hill, or in a lake or whatever. It was very boring. Then the Chosen showed up again, and released lots of us to be Spiritshadows. They took young Aenirans to be shadowguards, and quite a few Aenirans got released by accident as well. Only no one wanted to bind Adras and me as Spiritshadows until you and your friend Tal came along"

  "He is not my friend!" Milla said. She started walking again. There was much to think about. She had always known that there was a time before the Veil, but not that the barrier against the sun had been created to keep out Aenirans. Though it made sense. They became shadows on her world, and would be greatly weakened by darkness.

  The Forgetting and the Binding of the Aenirans was also very interesting. It sounded like exactly the sort of thing that the Crones could do, which suggested that "the second sort of Chosen" were in fact Icecarls.

  It all added up to the horrible realization that two thousand years ago,
Chosen and Icecarls had joined together to fight against the threat from Aenir. Then they had gone about their separate ways. But now the Chosen seemed to be undoing everything that had been won. They were releasing Aenirans and taking them to the Dark World to become Spiritshadows. And their excessive use of Sunstones weakened the defense against Spiritshadows offered by the Veil.

  Milla wondered if the Crones knew about all this. Did they know about Aenir, and the War, and their ancestors' part in it? Did they know what the Chosen were doing to Aenirans, and what it could mean to the Icecarls?

  Something moved ahead of Milla, interrupting her thoughts. Whatever it was, it was coming straight toward her. Without thinking, she threw the stone in her hand. It whizzed between the trees and struck with a loud and fatal-sounding crack.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Milla drew her sword and advanced cautiously.

  A small fluffy creature lay on the ground, its head crushed by the stone. Milla prodded it cautiously with her sword. It had the same sort of strange, thin fur on light bones that she'd seen before on the singing animals in the trees. Birds, as Tal had called them. But this bird had no wings and it had been running along the ground. And it was blue all over, except for its pointy beak, which was bright red.

  "What is this called?" Milla asked Odris. "Nanuch," said Odris. "Stupid and single-minded. They come in"

  Before she could finish, several more birds came running straight at Milla. The leader leaped up at her face and struck savagely with its pointed beak.

  Milla ducked, and struck back, but it had already run on, not looking back. She barely had time to turn as three more jumped up at her. Milla got the first one with a flung stone and then quickly stabbed the other two. But there were even more behind them, all running in a single, straight line straight toward her.

  "Flocks," continued Odris. "They should ignore you if you get out of the way. There's something else about them, too, but I can't remember…"