Lord of the Isles (17 page)
Authors: David Drake
G
arric swam up toward the lights glimmering on the surface of the black water. He could hear the breakers growling. His limbs were icy, but he forced them to move untilâ
arric swam up toward the lights glimmering on the surface of the black water. He could hear the breakers growling. His limbs were icy, but he forced them to move untilâ
“He's coming around!” Cashel said. “Back up and give him some room.”
Garric's eyes were already open. They suddenly focused on the world in which his body lay on the hard ground of the
inn's courtyard, his head in Cashel's lap. Scores of people stood around him, some of them holding lanterns or rushlights. Those had been the glimmers he saw in his dream state ⦠.
inn's courtyard, his head in Cashel's lap. Scores of people stood around him, some of them holding lanterns or rushlights. Those had been the glimmers he saw in his dream state ⦠.
“What happened?” he said. “Did I faint?”
His body ached and his palms felt as though they'd been stepped on by a shod horse. He curled them up so that he could see them. The tough callus wasn't broken, but his flesh still bore the bloodless impressions of whatever he'd been holding in a death grip moments before.
Tenoctris knelt beside him with two fingers of her left hand on his throat. Garric guessed she'd been murmuring a spell, because now he realized the drone of her voice had stopped.
“A lich attacked you, Garric,” she said. “You killed it with a log.”
“The axletree from inside the stable,” Cashel corrected automatically. “You swung it overhead.”
“What lich?” Garric said. Had he really picked the axletree up by himself? That'd explain why his shoulder muscles felt like they'd been minced for sausage, all right. “What is a lich?”
His father and the visiting drover squatted between Garric and an object on the ground. Reise stood with a grim face. He tapped Benlo's shoulder, saying, “Let the boy see. Maybe he knows what it is.”
Garric sat up cautiously. He wasn't dizzy, but in flashes he saw double: two different worlds through the same pair of eyes.
“I'm all right,” he said, more to convince himself than Cashel. Reise held a tallow-soaked hemlock stem close so that its soft yellow light gave Garric a good view of the corpse.
It was human. The skeleton was, at least. The axletree lying nearby had crushed the skull and broken the left collarbone as well as several of the upper ribs. Garric could see the damage plainly because the flesh cloaking the bones was jellylike, translucent where it wasn't water-clear.
“I don't remember it,” Garric said. He closed his eyes and
touched his temples lightly with his fingertips. He wasn't sure what he
did
remember. He wasn't even sure who he was.
touched his temples lightly with his fingertips. He wasn't sure what he
did
remember. He wasn't even sure who he was.
“I was sleeping in the stables,” he said with his eyes still closed. “I was dreaming. I dreamed that King Carus called me to get up. He was pointing toward me. I walked out of the stablesâ”
He opened his eyes and looked around the circle of friends and strangers. Benlo's six guards stood close about the drover with their swords drawn, looking nervous and uncomfortable.
“That's all I remember!” Garric said. He lurched to his feet and looked down at the creature they told him he'd killed. “I've never seen this thing before. I've never seen anything like this thing before. I don't know what it is.”
“It's a lich,” Tenoctris repeated. “It's the skeleton and soul of a drowned man, clothed with ooze from the deepest trenches of the sea. It's the work of a powerful wizard.”
“What wizard?” Benlo asked. He looked dazed and worried; Garric wondered if the drover also was feeling worlds balance in his mind. “Where?”
“I thought you might know, Master Benlo,” Cashel said in a tone that made the drover's guards stiffen. Garric was so aware of his friend's gentle nature that he tended to forget how a huge strong man with a quarterstaff would look to strangers who didn't know him.
And the guards were right, of course. The shepherd is gentle with his flock; but the man who'd crushed the skulls of three seawolves in a matter of seconds wasn't gentle under
all
circumstances.
all
circumstances.
“No,” Benlo said. “No, I have no idea.” The statement was convincing because of the puzzled frustration with which the drover spoke. He was too distracted to be frightened by Cashel's obvious anger.
Liane moved to the front of the crowd, looking from Garric to her father in double concern. Very deliberately, Ilna stepped in front of the other girl and nodded when she caught Garric's eye.
Garric looked down at the axletree. He toed it, feeling the
weight of oak shift only slightly. “I picked that up?” he said.
weight of oak shift only slightly. “I picked that up?” he said.
“Swung it like a feather,” Cashel agreed. “And a good thing you did, because it was coming for you with a sword.”
“I don't remember,” Garric said. The flesh was already beginning to slump off the lich's bones. The smell of rot and the sea lay heavily in the air. “I just don't remember.”
What part of Garric's mind did remember, though, was the feel of a long iron-hilted sword in his hand as he slashed through a band of liches very like the one he'd killed tonight.
A
soft rain fell and the air was more thickly humid than Sharina had ever felt it at home, even in the depths of August. The sun was a red blur near the western horizon. Huge tree ferns grew wherever the soil was bare, and runners with leaves sprouting from the joints crawled across the stone structures as well.
soft rain fell and the air was more thickly humid than Sharina had ever felt it at home, even in the depths of August. The sun was a red blur near the western horizon. Huge tree ferns grew wherever the soil was bare, and runners with leaves sprouting from the joints crawled across the stone structures as well.
The double line of men on the drag ropes stretched into the forest. A detachment of Blood Eagles, fully armed and tense, marched at the head of the column, but the sailors themselves seemed calm, even cheerful. Men joked with their fellows on the other rope. Glad to be alive, Sharina supposed.
She
certainly was.
She
certainly was.
“Your mother won't help you today,”
called one of the ship's officers, his thumbs hooked in his wide leather belt.
called one of the ship's officers, his thumbs hooked in his wide leather belt.
“Pull!”
roared the rowers, still over a hundred of them despite deaths and injuries in the storm. They leaned into beaching tackle made fast to the sternpost and dragged the trireme another pace up the ramp.
roared the rowers, still over a hundred of them despite deaths and injuries in the storm. They leaned into beaching tackle made fast to the sternpost and dragged the trireme another pace up the ramp.
The sailors could relax, because their task was over for the moment: they'd brought the vessel safe to harbor. The duties of the soldiers guarding the procurator had just begun.
Your father won't help you todaylPull!
“This is made for warships, isn't it?” Sharina said to Nonnus beside her. The smooth stone ramp was a hundred yards across, wide enough for dozens of triremes. It enabled ships to be drawn from the water for storage or repair. There were several similar constructions dimly visible around the harbor. “This is a real port, not just a beach where people pull their boats up at night.”
“It's a real port,” Nonnus agreed without emotion. Like the soldiers he was alert, though in his case it was more the alertness of a hunter than of someone who thinks he may be prey. “They've nothing better than this in Valles. Nothing this good.”
He drew his toe deeply across the sloping surface. Leaf mold humped up to either side of the trough. Beneath was the base layer of pinkish-gray gneiss, polished to a dull sheen. Every structure Sharina could seeâthe roofed shelters, the bollards for holding ships once they'd been drawn to safety, the ramp itselfâwas of the same dense, millstone-hard material.
Your sister won't help you today/Pull!
“I'd have thought there'd be mud all over everything if it just came up from the sea,” Sharina said, hoping she didn't sound nervous. “This is just forest litter like you'd find in the woods back home.”
There was nothing as frightening here as what she'd faced in the storm; but during the storm, she'd given up hope. Hope was dangerous because if you hoped, then you had something to lose.
“I would have expected mud too,” the hermit said dryly. “But these trees didn't grow under the sea either. Whatever's going on isn't as simple as the sea bottom flexing.”
A salamander barked at the humans from the heart of a plant whose spiked leaves formed a cup. The beast's skin was gray with stripes of indigo and blue; its outstretched tongue was blue as well. It looked like nothing Sharina had ever seen
before, but it was scarcely a foot long and certainly no threat in itself.
before, but it was scarcely a foot long and certainly no threat in itself.
Your brother won't help you todaylPull!
Kizuta, now the trireme's acting captain, stood on the poop, where he oversaw the proceedings. “That's high enough!” he shouted. “Tie her off with double lashings. I
don't
trust this calm weather to stay!”
don't
trust this calm weather to stay!”
Sharina walked slowly away from the ship, knowing that the hermit would follow. “You think we're here because of what Meder did, don't you?” she asked in a low voice. She didn't intend to go far, but she wanted Nonnus to be able to give his honest opinion of the situation out of possible earshot of anyone else.
Asera had disembarked, like most of the crew and passengers. She stood beside one of the open-fronted shelters with her arms wrapped tightly around her body in a sign of nervousness. Wainer was at her side, holding a drawn sword and trying to look in all directions at once. Nine more Blood Eagles, carrying spears and sweating in their full armor, formed a rank between the procurator and the jungle beyond.
The mist softened the outlines even of objects only fifty feet away. Leaf mold covered horizontal surfaces, but the vertical edges of structures on shore were all the same polished pinkish-gray color.
Nonnus looked back toward the looming trireme. Meder was still aboard, hunched in the bow behind a screen to shield his actions from others. He had a fire going in a small jug; occasionally a puff of colored smoke rose into the low clouds.
“I don't know,” he said. “I don't think Meder raised the storm. Maybe he didn't have anything to do with Tegma either.”
The island climbed from the shore, though it was hard to be sure of the exact slope because of fog and the thick vegetation. Paths paved with gneiss blocks led into the forest from the harbor. They were edged with low curbs rather than railings.
Most of the sailors were free to explore now that they'd
pulled the vessel to a dry berth. Their footprints scarred the dark litter and their voices drifted from among the trees, mingled with those of Tegma's wildlife.
pulled the vessel to a dry berth. Their footprints scarred the dark litter and their voices drifted from among the trees, mingled with those of Tegma's wildlife.
There was no sign of the people who had built these remarkable structures.
“I don't think Meder knows whether he's responsible for this or not,” Sharina said. Until she forced herself to speak the words, she'd been keeping the fear only half-formed at the back of her mind. “I don't think he understands all of what he's doing. I don't think he understands
half
of what he's doing.”
half
of what he's doing.”
“Tenoctris said the same thing,” Nonnus said mildly. “I wish she was here now. But then, I wish a lot of things.”
He squatted at the top of the docking facility, his javelin in his right hand. His left index finger poked into the leaf litter with the care of a surgeon working in a victim's chest. A worm twisted away in blind terror, vanishing again into the mold like rain on sand. The subsoil only a few inches beneath the surface was a dense yellow clay.
Sailors were clearing the long, shallow shelters. They had no front wall, only square-sided pillars to support roofs so low that most of the men had to duck to keep from hitting their heads. They provided cover from the rain because there was no wind to blow droplets onto those inside.
Another party of sailors brought ashore the men injured too badly to walk by themselves. There were several dead as well, rowers who'd been brained or had their chests crushed by oars flailing during the storm. Men with mattocks dragged them into the forest. The yellow clay would be difficult to dig; a layer of leaf litter would probably suffice to cover the corpses. Had the trireme not been in port, seawolves would have formed the burial detail.
“Let's look at these trees,” Nonnus said. Glancing aside to make sure Sharina was following, he walked toward a stand of smaller growth. Though the plants were jointed like grasses, the inside was a pulpy solid when the hermit severed a six-inch stem with two quick strokes of his Pewle knife.
The rain had stopped or at least paused. Sailors returned from the forest with a salamander the size of a fox that they'd killed with their sheath knives. Some of the group split a fallen branch to reach the dry wood inside; another sharpened a sapling to use for a spit.
The local wildlife was easy to catch and perfectly edible so far as the crew and Sharina were concerned. She wondered if Asera and the wizard would feel the same way about the writhing amphibians.
Nonnus paced thirty feet along the trunk to where the tree narrowed into a dozen ropy branches, then lopped the top off as well. He eyed the remainder of the stand, looking for an exact match.
“Wainer!” a soldier called, running down from the forest. His feet skidded on the fallen debris when he tried to stop. One of the men guarding Asera caught him to keep him from falling flat.
“We've found a city!” the man said. “A whole city up on top of the hill, and there's no one there!”
Wainer and Asera stepped closer to the messenger. All three talked with animation, but too quietly for Sharina to hear from where she stood.
“Nonnus,” she said, lowering her own voice although no one was close by. “What do you think is going to happen?”
He shrugged and gave her a wry smile. “I don't suppose we were brought here for any reason that would please me to learn, child,” he said. “But better here than the bottom of the Inner Sea or a lizard's belly. Alive is better than dead.”
The hermit notched another tree, then pushed it over with a powerful thrust of his shoulders.
“That should take care of the outriggers,” he said. “Now, let's go see if we can borrow a proper axe to fell a tree big enough for our dugout's hull.”
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