Chimaera (100 page)

She set the thapter down a little way from the blue lyrinx, who immediately changed to the black of coal. He was huge and had a golden crest, the only one Irisis had ever seen. He folded his arms and waited. A wall of lyrinx surrounded them, and their colours and patterns were threatening.

Gilhaelith lifted one leg over the side. ‘Do you think showing your face is a good idea?’ said Malien.

‘I’m dying. What do I have to lose?’

Gilhaelith went down and planted the truce flag deep in the salt. The lyrinx made a collective ratchetting sound, perhaps representing a hiss, and surged forward as one. A female voice called a command, they stopped and the circle parted to admit five more lyrinx, two males and three females, carrying lanterns. Four lacked wings but showed blue truce colours. The fifth had thin, colourless, unarmoured skin and translucent, soaring wings. The surrounding lyrinx retreated until the circle around the thapter was about two hundred paces across.

The five joined the golden-crested male, twenty paces away from the thapter.

‘The leading wingless male is Ryll,’ said Tiaan. ‘The colourless female is Liett. I don’t know the others.’

Irisis wondered if they could possibly be the leaders of this vast gathering. They seemed too young. Anyway, the lyrinx were led by matriarchs, so they must be here as translators.

A group of five weathered females moved across from the other side of the circle, but stopped twenty paces away, arms folded. The remaining matriarchs, Irisis assumed.

After a long interval of silence Ryll held out a hand. ‘Tiaan.’ He gave what passed for a smile. ‘Nish; you lead a busy life. I don’t know your name,’ he said to Irisis, ‘though I do remember you. We fought, once, on the other side of the world.’

‘I haven’t forgotten,’ said Irisis, taking his leathery hand. ‘And this is Malien, Matah of the Aachim of Santhenar.’

‘Malien from the time the Forbidding was broken?’ said Ryll.

‘The same,’ said Malien. ‘You know the Histories, then?’

‘We know everything we’ve been able to learn about humanity – our Histories that might have been.’

Malien bowed and he did too, then extended his hand. She took it.

Ryll turned to Gilhaelith. ‘In the circumstances, Tetrarch, I won’t shake hands with you.’

Gilhaelith bowed, although with his odd-shaped, elongated frame and woolly head it was not a dignified gesture. ‘In the circumstances, I had not thought you would.’

‘Here is Great Anabyng,’ said Ryll. The black male did not offer to shake hands.

‘My negotiators are Liett,’ said Ryll, ‘whom some of you know.’ Liett shook hands with ostentatious reluctance. ‘Also Daodand, H’nant and Plyyr.’ Ryll indicated, in turn, the other male and the two females, one larger than him, the other smaller than Liett and also lacking skin armour. Plyyr looked almost human. The matriarchs said nothing.

Daodand carried a leather box which he opened to produce ten drinking horns, a large skin and a smaller box containing some kind of crusted delicacy. He squeezed fluid from the skin into the horns. H’nant and Plyyr passed them around, then the morsels.

Irisis surreptitiously sniffed the liquor, which was thick and had a faint citrus odour, a cross between lime and grapefruit.

‘If you don’t like strong drink,’ said Ryll, ‘take only a taste. This
hurrj
is old and very potent.’

Irisis tasted it with her tongue. It was sweet, strongly flavoured and the spirits burned her nose. She took a small sip, then one of the delicacies, which had the crumbly texture of a sweet biscuit but with a creamy tartness.

‘Why have you come?’ said Ryll.

‘To talk about your situation,’ said Malien.

‘What is there to talk about?’ said Liett savagely. ‘Just get it over with; don’t come here to gloat first.’

Ryll shook his head at her. Liett snapped her wings in his face. Great Anabyng made a peremptory noise in his throat and Liett folded her wings at once.

‘Scrutator Flydd has been outvoted,’ said Malien. ‘The governors have decided that your people are to be expunged. We’re here because we cannot agree to genocide. Yet neither do we want another war the like of which the world has suffered. Accordingly, we have a proposal.’

When she did not go on, Liett said, ‘What is it?’

‘Tiaan?’ Malien prompted.

‘Vithis the Aachim built a tower on the pinnacle of Nithmak,’ said Tiaan, ‘some forty leagues south-west of here.’

‘We’ve seen this watch-tower from the air,’ said Liett. ‘What of it?’

‘It’s not a watch-tower. It was designed to create a portal, to bring Vithis’s lost First Clan home from the void.’

‘The decadent Aachim could not survive there,’ said H’nant in a purring growl.

‘Not even in their constructs?’ said Malien in a frosty voice.

H’nant sneered at the very idea.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Gilhaelith. ‘They were found in the middle of the Dry Sea – dead! However, the portal remains.’

‘Get on with it,’ said Liett.

‘There is a world called Tallallame,’ said Tiaan. ‘The third of the Three Worlds.’

‘We know of it.’ Ryll shifted uncomfortably, then glanced at Great Anabyng, who remained expressionless.

Irisis couldn’t help wondering why neither the matriarchs nor their truly great mancer were taking part in the meeting.

‘It is a paradise of forest, lake and meadow,’ Tiaan went on, ‘the most beautiful world that ever was, according to the Faellem. The
Tale of the Mirror
tells that Tallallame was also … invaded by creatures from the void when the Forbidding was broken. Thranx went there, as well as lorrsk and other savage creatures. Its native people, the Faellem, are no more. Or at least, they are civilised no more.’

‘Am I to take it that you’re offering us a choice?’ said Ryll with a savage smile. ‘To go to Tallallame and attempt to wrest it from the creatures that now possess it, or stay here and die?’

‘No creature could be better fitted for Tallallame than lyrinx,’ said Tiaan.

‘It’s a trick,’ said Liett. ‘They’ve come here to torment us – to offer us hope then snatch it away again.’

‘All we want,’ said Malien, ‘is for the war to be over with no more killing on either side.’

‘Words are always more convincing when they’re backed up by deeds,’ said Ryll. ‘How do you plan to demonstrate good faith?’

‘I have your sacred relics in the thapter,’ said Malien. ‘I would give you the first crate now, and the others at the gate.’

‘I didn’t know that!’ cried Tiaan.

Malien smiled. ‘It was such a short flight that no one went down the ladder. Gilhaelith and I pulled a little trick on the guards, though we had the devil of a job getting the crates down the hatch by ourselves.’

Ryll stood up to his full height, quivering with emotion, and his skin colours flared so brightly that they lit up everything inside the circle. ‘Show us the relics.’

Inside the thapter the lyrinx squeezed downstairs, in small groups, and the lids were taken off. Ryll, who came last, stared down into the crates, one after another, his skin muted now in consideration of the others. Finally he motioned for the lids to be refastened and clambered out.

‘We could take the crates,’ he said.

‘And what better faith could we show than by bringing them here?’ said Malien. ‘But if we gave them to you at Nithmak it would save you carrying them forty leagues. That would save lyrinx lives, I’m sure.’

‘What makes you think you can open this gate?’ said Liett in a low, disturbing purr.

‘Vithis gave me the key.’ Malien showed them the sapphire rod.

‘And how would you direct it to Tallallame?’

‘I know the way of old,’ said Malien.

‘I don’t trust them.’ Liett snapped her grey teeth. ‘They mean to send us back to the void.’

‘Why would they bother?’ Ryll said patiently.

‘To salve their precious consciences. Truly these weaklings would not survive a day there. Not even an hour!’

‘Not even the void would be as bad as being herded here, like beasts in our own ordure, until we die of thirst,’ said Ryll, whose skin showed truce-blue again. ‘We survived in the void before; if we must, we can do so again. But Tallallame, Liett.’ He reached out to her. ‘Just think of it! A beautiful world all for ourselves. For that, I would take the chance.’

‘And I,’ said H’nant.

Plyyr hesitated. ‘There are places in the void of unimaginable savagery; places that are worse than dying here. I mistrust this offer. They don’t want to salve their consciences; they seek the bitterest revenge they can inflict on us.’

Ryll looked to Great Anabyng as if for guidance. He glanced at the silent women, who nodded as one. ‘The former matriarchs do not vote, and neither do I. Our time has passed,’ Anabyng said in a deep growl. ‘For myself, my beloved consort, Gyrull, is dead and I will soon join her. I would not have our bones sundered by the void. You must decide – that is why you’ve been appointed.’

‘And swiftly,’ said Ryll. ‘We have little water left. Already our little children are suffering. In three days they’ll start to die. In five, only the hardiest will be alive. In seven days, none of us.’

‘You have been appointed leader, in defiance of all convention,’ snarled Liett with another snap of her magnificent wings. ‘You boasted of all the marvels you would do.
Then lead us!
’

‘What convention is that?’ Tiaan asked curiously.

‘That we be led by a revered matriarch, not an unmated, wingless monstrosity of a
male
.’

‘Matriarch Gyrull appointed me before she died,’ he said mildly. ‘Your own mother. You yourself told me so.’

‘She was out of her mind with pain,’ Liett said.

‘Great Anabyng confirmed her intentions. Besides, I did not boast. Matriarch asked me what I would do if I were leader, and I told her. I had no desire to be patriarch. We’ve not had one in three thousand years.’

‘So that’s how you see yourself, you unmated male dog!’ cried Liett in a passion. ‘The last patriarch was a disaster; that’s why we never took another. And you will be even worse.’

Ryll turned his back on her, saying to the others, ‘I know Tiaan and I trust her. Malien, too, I know to be a woman of honour.’

‘They’re the only two in all humanity!’ hissed Liett.

Ryll ignored her. ‘I will go through the gate, and if it leads me asunder, even to the most desperate recesses of the void, I will do all I can to lead us out again.’ His eyes shone in his fervour. ‘What about you, Liett?’

‘I will not follow any unmated
male
unless the vote is entirely against me.’

‘Since when do lyrinx vote?’ said Ryll mildly. ‘We do what our leaders, in their wisdom, have decided.’

‘You broke the custom,’ she snapped. ‘I demand a vote.’

Ryll’s gaze rested on each of the lyrinx, then he nodded. ‘And how do you vote?’

‘The past must not bind the future,’ said Great Anabyng. ‘I will not vote.’

The former matriarchs also declined. The other three lyrinx gave Ryll their vote. Liett did not.

‘Not just
us
,’ said Liett. ‘
All
the lyrinx must vote.’ She swept around the circle of lyrinx with one arm.

‘We are over half a million,’ Ryll said. ‘It would take days to count.’

‘So be it.’ Liett folded her arms across her breast.

‘Do you want the small children to die, and the old folk, because of this delay?’

‘In the absence of our matriarchs, I demand that convention be followed.’

‘Come with me. Look at the state of the children.’ Taking Liett’s arm, he led her away from the other lyrinx. He had to drag her for the first three steps, whereupon she cuffed him hard over the side of the head and, mollified by the display of aggression, went willingly.

As they reached the surrounding circle, Ryll’s truce-blue faded and they disappeared into the crowd. They were gone almost an hour. When they returned, Ryll said without preamble, ‘We will do it.’ He clasped Tiaan’s hand, then each of the others’. ‘But first you must break the mind-shock circle,
if you can
.’

‘I can,’ said Tiaan, ‘since I know how it was made. How long will it take you to get to Nithmak?’

‘We can run forty leagues in two days and nights,’ said Daodand. ‘Though, running with so little water …’

‘The children will die of thirst,’ said Tiaan.

‘Most will,’ said Liett. ‘Unless you allow us sufficient power to fly them there.’

‘We can’t, Tiaan,’ said Nish. ‘What if they break free and begin the war over?’

‘You expect us to trust you,’ cried Liett, ‘yet you do not trust us in return.’

‘That is the privilege of the victors,’ said Nish.

Malien shushed him and conferred with Tiaan for a moment, then called Irisis. ‘Is there a way to cut off the field controller on one side only?’

Irisis had to think for a minute. ‘You might do it this way, with the amplimet …’

After listening to the explanation Tiaan said, ‘It won’t work for long, but it should last long enough for them to break out. And once they’re going full speed in the dark, the mind-shockers won’t be able to encircle them again.’

‘What about us?’ said Irisis.

‘What do you mean?’

‘What if Orgestre orders the field controller directed against us?’

‘They’ll be far too busy trying to contain the enemy,’ said Malien. ‘They can’t do both.’

‘We wouldn’t see the children die,’ said Tiaan to Ryll. ‘We’ll allow you power for flight, but should anyone abuse this offer, I’ll withdraw that power while you’re flying. From all of you.’

Liett’s yellow eyes glowed. ‘I think that I like you after all, little human! You have my word.’

‘And mine. Let it be done,’ said Ryll.

‘And done swiftly,’ Irisis added. ‘While our opponents are sleeping.’

They went up in the thapter. It was well after midnight and the night still overcast. Shortly the agreed signal was flashed vertically from the lyrinx camp. Tiaan used the amplimet to break the mind-shock circle on the western side. The lyrinx burst out and the clankers retreated in terror. Soon the fliers among the lyrinx, perhaps a tenth of their number, took to the air carrying the children.

‘We’re taking an almighty risk,’ said Nish. ‘If they break their word and the war begins again, we’ll be the most reviled names in all the Histories. Our best choice will be to go straight to the Well, for there’ll be no hiding on Santhenar.’