Half Discovered Wings (53 page)

There was more to the obelisk than there seemed from afar. It
was situated in the centre of a cleared space in the forest, where
the trees were much less dense and the ground rose gradually into a
hill. Sarai quickly scaled this until she reached the pillar of
vine-embroiled rock.

‘
Isaac!’ she cried, voice muffled by the mask. ‘Isaac, where
are you?’

There wasn’t a
reply at first. She looked up and saw a fire spluttering out,
dampened by the tension of the building storm. A sudden violent
wind shook her.

‘
Isaac!’ she yelled again. Her call was split by
lightning.

‘
Sarai?’ said a quiet voice, from behind the rock. ‘Is that
Sarai?’

A figure,
crowned in a silver nimbus of starlight, stepped into view.

‘
Johnmal?’ she said, moving closer. ‘Is it you?’

They rushed toward each other, and embraced.

~

Whilst Sarai
had been running, another figure had been moving with equal speed
in the opposite direction. He was lean and nimble, barely leaving
footprints in the wet mud.

He had seen a second tendril of smoke, another fire – so
close to the obelisk – and had instantly made his way toward it,
leaving the signal fire to diminish. He stumbled into a clearing,
where two men and a woman sat in a circle, warming themselves in
silence underneath a fragile makeshift canopy.

The girl looked up, surprised, but said nothing. One of the
men, the oldest-looking, saw him too, and said, ‘Hello! You must be
Isaac.’

‘
Who are you?’ said Isaac. ‘And why are you here? You’re close
to danger here.’

‘
We head toward it,’ mumbled the second man, from underneath
his hat.

‘
Your mother travels with us,’ said the first. ‘She has run to
the signal to find you.’

‘
What? My mother was here?’ asked Isaac. His eyes saw the
clothes-parcel, and he picked it up.

~

Sarai pulled back from the embrace and looked up at the man.
She had forgotten just how tall Johnmal was.

‘
Is Isaac with you,’ she asked quickly, ‘is he
safe?’

‘
He’s fine,’ said Johnmal, shadowed from the light of the moon,
his face an oily pit. ‘He’s okay. Sarai, it’s been so
long.’

‘
I know it,’ she said urgently, ‘but my son, is he with you? I
must see him, Johnmal, my love.’

‘
He’s not here.’

‘
So where is he? Did he not set this fire? Did you not set him
free?’

‘
He’s around here, somewhere. I’ve been looking for
him.’

The air felt close and suffocating. A second fork of dry
lightning cut across the sky, illuminating a jagged reflective
object secreted in Johnmal’s hand.

~

‘
This is my mother’s,’ Isaac said, pulling loose a black cotton
outfit from the pack. ‘She
was
here. Why with you people? Why was she not
looking for me?’

‘
She has been—’ the magus tried to say.

‘
You say she ran toward the signal?’ the young man asked,
looking back. ‘But I was being followed.’

‘
By whom?’

‘
He means to kill us both! My mother…’ He began to strip,
pulling off a filthy white shirt and torn black pantaloons. He
yanked on Sarai’s spare outfit, tearing out the voice-temper from
the mask.

‘
That won’t help you,’ Gabel said hoarsely.

‘
What do you know?’ he snapped, throwing away a second facebelt
and ripping off the rest of mask. He looked so much like Sarai,
with his dark skin and matted black hair. All he was missing were
the all-green errant eyes.

‘
Where are you going?’

‘
My mother’s in danger,’ he said, and vanished into the
trees.

~

‘
I understand that things have changed,’ Johnmal said, stepping
close. ‘None of it matters.’

‘
I want to see my son,’ said Sarai.

‘
Will you not hold me first?’ He came closer still. ‘I want
only you.’

She backed
away and brandished her kukri. ‘That’s enough, Johnmal.’

‘
You’d fight me?’ he asked. ‘But I love you. I love both of
you. I want us all to be together, as a family.’

He lunged, and the object in his hand was revealed to be a
short sword. It flashed through the cold air, as the forest was
suddenly freezing now, no longer heated by the burning sun but
cooled by the indifferent moon, and dampened by the still air.
Sarai shivered as she leapt backward, Johnmal’s attack falling
short.

‘
Where are your senses, Johnmal?’ she cried. ‘If you’ve harmed
Isaac, you’d better fall on that blade yourself, before I take it
and do it for you!’

‘
Such words!’ cried the man, swiping a second time, a third.
‘You’re threatening the father of your only son, and accuse him of
monstrosities…’

‘
You’ve
become
a monster,’ she replied, swiftly moving behind and knocking
his legs from under him. He landed awkwardly but managed to avoid
her second attack. ‘You said no matter what you’d do, no matter how
long you’d stay there with
him
, you wouldn’t forget,
you’d
never forget
who your son was!’

Johnmal’s roll turned into a leap and he was on his feet,
swinging with his sword but missing every time, but his failures
did not hinder him. He turned each unsuccessful sweep into
another.

Isaac stumbled into the clearing then, first seeing the great
obelisk rising up before him, and then catching sight of the two
silver objects sending sparks off each other at its base. He
recognised his mother and father, and their blades.

He didn’t call
out for fear of distracting Sarai, but she saw him anyway – this
reflection, standing by the trees – and she called out; it was all
Johnmal needed.

The short
sword was long enough to run her through to the hilt and still
leave three inches to cut into the tower of stone behind her. She
froze, nailed to the rock as Johnmal tore off her face mask.

‘
You’re still beautiful, Sarai,’ he whispered, and now she
could see his contorted face in the moonlight, an ambivalent
grimace. She didn’t have the strength to spit in his
face.

‘
Father!
’ Isaac screamed, and like lightning he was across the
clearing and by his mother’s side. He didn’t possess Sarai’s errant
genes, nor his father’s indoctrinated zeal for bloodshed, but he
had Sarai’s training and his own strength and will. It showed when
he pulled the sword from his mother’s chest and flung it to the
ground, gently putting her to rest in the ferns.

‘
You!’ Johnmal snarled, curling his lip. ‘What do you have?
Your blood is plain and useless; you should lie beside her and save
me a job.’

‘
Have you forgotten again?’ Isaac hissed. ‘Have you let your
mind be sullied again?’

‘
You’re my son,’ he said.

‘
Yes,’ he said, ‘I am, yet you would kill me?’

‘
I would,’ Johnmal replied, taking up the short sword, ‘because
those are my orders, and because there’s nothing but cold air
between us to stop me!’

The sword gleamed silver as it swung in a downward
arc—

—
And Isaac caught a face full of hot sparks; Caeles’ wakizashi
vibrated in his grip, struck firmly by Johnmal’s blade, but he kept
his grip and persevered, pushing with all his strength and knocking
his father to the ground. Johnmal skidded in the mud, but got up
immediately.

Isaac steadied his stance, putting one foot back and twisting
it, digging his heel into the ground, just as Sarai had taught him.
He could hear her shallow breathing behind him, quick and thin. He
tried to keep his eyes wide, to concentrate only on what was
happening: the way Johnmal moved, how the muscles in his legs
bunched as he prepared to run, how the bulk of his shoulder twisted
as he tightened his grip on the hilt of his weapon, and how he
leaned forward slightly when he kicked off, and charged.

The metal blades struck against each other three times, and
at the fourth Isaac moved not to defend, but to attack. The sharp
edge sliced across Johnmal’s stomach and opened it. Johnmal’s hand
lowered and he caught his insides, blood squirting through his
fingers.

‘
You little brat,’ he groaned. ‘What do you hope to achieve
here?’

‘
Vengeance for my mother.’

‘
She’s not even dead yet. See for yourself.’

‘
I will not.’

‘
Not as stupid as you
look
!’ he cried, screaming the last
word as he lunged and swung, but missed. Isaac dove around to the
left, kicked Johnmal in the back of the leg. He dropped to his
knee. He tried to stand but Isaac kicked him again, and blocked a
weak strike with his blade.

Isaac’s father looked up at him. ‘I remember when you were
conceived,’ he said quietly. The air was bristling with an
impending shower, thunder rolling. The ground was still soggy from
the latest rainfall, and mud swilled up around Johnmal’s legs. ‘It
was far away from here. In Sarai’s own country. It’s always hot
there, always bright. The people … they just lie around all day and
smoke –
smoke
! –
and do nothing. They fish for a living!’

‘
Don’t try to distract me, father.’

‘
You still call me that?’

‘
I can’t change it, much as I’d like. I’m stuck with you. The
man who killed my mother: my father!’

Johnmal’s breathing was ragged. Blood leaked out from behind
his hand, soaking his clothes. It mingled darkly with the
mud.

‘
You’re not stuck with me. You have a blade in your hand. Only
a single pull there, or just a quick plunge through my heart, is
needed. You could hack off my head, even.’

‘
I’d rather wait for your innards to fall out.’

‘
That wouldn’t take long. It would … hurt me much more, though,
my son.’

‘
Don’t try to plead. Nothing will change by reminding me whose
blood flows within me. It won’t work!’ Isaac yelled. ‘It will never
work. But you don’t need to remind me; I know, father, I will
always know and remember. But I will also remember that it was I
that killed you. Are you
listening
?’

Johnmal was mumbling. His face almost touched the ground, and
he clutched his stomach weakly. ‘One last time,’ he was muttering,
‘one last time, and I might not be able to turn back…’

‘
Are you
listening
?’ Isaac screamed, lifting high
the blade and preparing to swing.

Johnmal leaned
back suddenly, cried out, and disappeared. Clothes fluttered like a
fountain as they were thrown off and settled in the mud.

‘
No!’ Isaac yelled, swinging the sword wildly, hitting nothing.
‘Come back here! Where are you? Let me see you!’

Laughter
tinkled at him, dancing in circles Isaac couldn’t follow.

‘
My son!’ echoed Johnmal’s voice. ‘You should have struck when
you had the chance!’

Isaac lashed
with the sword, the blade hissing in the darkness, but it struck
only air. He stumbled left and right, trying desperately to find
footprints but seeing none, hoping to see a branch move or a stone
tumble, but his hopes were unanswered. He couldn’t hear Johnmal’s
movements for the thunder.

‘
Rain,’ he pleaded quietly. ‘Rain!’

‘
Where’s the bad weather when you want it?’ laughed the voice.
‘Oh, Isaac, you’re so hideously pathetic, I can’t bear to be seen
with you anymore.’ His voice was orbiting Isaac, around and around
so that he couldn’t follow it.

Isaac was
thumped roughly from behind, and heard laughter again. He spun, saw
nothing.

Isaac was hit
again, a hard punch to the face. He staggered. He pleaded for a
storm, but got only thunder. Again he was attacked by the invisible
assailant, knocked to his knees. A fist hit him in the face, and he
felt searing pain. He was left on the ground, feeling his face
swell. His vision narrowed. The rain wasn’t going to fall. He
scanned the area and his eyes settled on his mother, who wasn’t
moving. She was only a dark, still shape under the trees.

From the corner of his eye he saw movement: Johnmal’s
short-sword had been knocked from him and stuck point-down in the
mud, but was now being moved. It floated upward and, as Isaac
feigned ignorance, bobbed mid-air toward him. He looked down at the
floor for a second—

There was a flash of blurred blade and silver, and Isaac
slashed with the wakizashi; the floating sword fell, and in its
place shot a bright spurt of blood. Red poured eerily outward from
an invisible stump as Johnmal lost his sword, and the arm with
which to lift it. Isaac heard a scream right beside his ear, and an
unseen foot suddenly connected with his face. He fell.

The sword was once again lifted, carried presumably by
Johnmal’s other arm, and Isaac felt himself pinned down by the
chest. The sword swung viciously upward, and Johnmal’s voice
growled from very close by: