Nightrise (25 page)

There was nothing inside the temple. They were in a round space — it reminded Jamie of a circus —

protected by brick walls that rose up about forty feet all around them. There had been frescoes once, strange symbols and pictures of animals and birds. But they had almost worn away. Or perhaps they had been purposefully erased.

Jamie had at last been able to wash — using water drawn from a well. Nobody had offered him any privacy and he had been reluctant to undress, especially with Scar around. Fortunately, she had disappeared for a time and none of the men had so much as glanced in his direction. The water was muddy before he even got into it, but even so he had been grateful for it, washing away the grime and the blood that covered him. There were no towels. He had pulled on his pants and dried himself in front of the flames.

After that, he had been fed. Corian had cooked some sort of meat over the fire. It tasted like chicken but it was tougher, harder to chew. Jamie had no idea what it was and decided it might be better not to ask. It had been served with beans and solid slabs of bread. He had been given a bowl of steaming liquid to drink. It tasted bitter and sweet at the same time, and Scar — who had returned in time for the meal —

had told him that it was made with acorns and honey. Jamie was glad to have it. Just holding something warm between his hands made him feel better.

And now they were talking. The two brothers were resting against a wall, leaning against each other shoulder-to-shoulder with their legs stretched out in front of them. Finn was squatting on a broken piece of column, gnawing at a bone, his fingers covered in grease. Scar and Jamie were sitting cross-legged in front of the fire. As she spoke, Jamie could see its reflection, dancing in her eyes.

"Finn has often told me that the world wasn't always like this," she went on. "A long time ago there were no shape-changers and death squads and overlords and fire riders and all the rest of them. But this is all I've ever known so don't ask me for a history lesson. I never met my mother or my father. By the time I was born, most people never knew their parents. All I can remember is being carried around by different people. Someone would take me with them and just when I was getting to know them and thinking that they were kind, they'd be killed and someone else would take their place. And everything was always ruined, like this city. I don't think I ever spent more than a few days in a house before it was broken to pieces or burned down." She raised her bowl in mockery of a toast. "Welcome to the end of the world, Jamie. Because that's where you are."

''You called me Jamie." Jamie wasn't sure where to begin. It was all too much to take in. "But before, you said I was Sapling." He glanced in the direction of the main square. "They called me Sapling."

"There is no point calling you Sapling," Scar replied. "Because you're not him even if you do look exactly like him and all those people think you are him." She gestured in the direction of the square. "I imagine you're confused."

''You could say that."

"Well, so am I. I just hope Matt will explain it all eventually, although he can be very annoying at times and never gives you a straight answer to anything."

'You mentioned Matt before," Jamie said. "Who is he?"

"Matt's the one in charge. He's our leader. The first of the Five. He's the one who's supposed to understand what's going on." .

The Five. When he was at the prison, Joe Feather had said he was one of the Five. Had Joe known something about this world and the events that had taken place here?

"Tell me about Matt," Jamie said. He pictured someone like Finn, gray-haired and battle-scarred. "Is he old?"

Scar laughed. "No. He's the same age as us. Do you really not know who we are? You and Flint and me and Inti and Matt?"

"Flint is my twin."

''Yes."

"Then he's Scott. I was looking for him when I was shot. That's how I ended up here." It still made no sense to Jamie, even as he tried to explain it. Then he remembered. "I have seen you before," he said.

"But it wasn't real. It was in a dream."

He thought Scar would laugh at him, but she nodded, perfectly serious. "People used to think that dreams didn't mean anything," she said. "That they were just things that happened when you went to sleep. But we use them all the time. There's a dream world that we visit sometimes, and that's how we found out who we were. That's how we found each other in the first place."

'You should start at the beginning," Finn called out. He had finished his food. He threw the bone onto the fire. The flames devoured it as if they were as hungry as he had been. 'You're a rotten storyteller."

"There was no beginning for me," Scar retorted. "Or if there was, I don't remember it. Matt's the only one who knows the whole truth, and he never tells us anything."

"Start with the Five!" Finn insisted.

"All right. All right." Scar sighed. "But don't interrupt me, Finn. You only make it more difficult."

"Adults taking second place to children!" Finn shook his head in despair. "That's what I really call the end of the world." He fell silent.

Scar turned to Jamie. "I've only been alive for about fiffteen years," she said. "And this war has continued for more than fifty. So that's why I say that, for me, there's never been a beginning. I wasn't even in this country. I was far away, on the other side of the world, and when I was about nine years old, the village where I was living was burned down. All the old people were killed. The children were sent to the mines."

"Wait a minute." Jamie was already lost. "This world you live in…is this my world? What year is it? I don't even know where I am!"

"And I don't know where you've come from, so I can't help you. You're just going to have to listen to my story. And if you keep interrupting, we're not going to get anywhere."

Jamie sighed. "Go on."

"We were digging for precious stones. There were thousands of us…working deep underground. They used the children to burrow into the smaller tunnels. It was terrifying. There were cave-ins. We were always wondering when we were going to be buried alive."

"Who made you do it? Who were you working for?"

"We were working for the ruling classes. The overlords and the advisors. And behind them, of course, the Old Ones."

"Who are they?" Jamie remembered the old man, talking to him before he had turned into a scorpion. He had asked if Jamie served the Old Ones.

"They're the enemy," Scar replied simply. "Matt says that they are the first and the greatest evil, that they were born the day the world began. They want to destroy us.

That's the only reason they exist. But they want to do it slowly, one step at a time. You see, they feed on human misery. It's what nourishes them. In the end, they'll kill all of us, but they'll make it last as long as they can."

"Where did they come from?" Jamie asked.

"I don't know," Scar replied. 'You'll have to ask Matt."

Erin had fallen asleep, leaning against his brother. His long, fair hair had fallen across his face, and his metal hand was stretched out in front of him, the fingers curled and pointing up. Corian was lying still, careful not to wake him up, listening to Scar tell her tale.

"I suppose it must have been about a year ago," she went on. "I don't know because time doesn't really mean very much anymore. When you're a slave, being beaten and forced to work in the darkness, every day is the same. Anyway, about a year ago I found out that I was different. I was told that I was one of the Five."

"Matt told you?"

Scarlet nodded. 'Yes. Well, he came to me in a dream. Or maybe I went to him. It's very difficult to explain. But you say you've had dreams too. You must know what I'm talking about."

"I think so." Jamie thought back. "There's a sea with black water. And the stars are shining but it's not exactly night…"

"There's an island."

'Yes." Jamie was excited. She knew what he was talking about. "And two boys in a straw boat."

"Matt and Inti." She looked at him curiously. "Have you been to the library?"

The question was so unexpected that Jamie was taken aback. "What library?" he asked.

"In the dream world."

"No. I never saw any buildings."

"Forget it." Scar had lost her train of thought. She gazed into the fire as if she might find it there, then went on. "Anyway, that's how I first met Matt. He came to me in a dream and he explained everything to me. There were five of us in different countries. He was here. I was where I was. Sapling and Flint were on the other side of the world, and Inti…I don't know where he came from, and neither, for that matter, does he. But the point was, we'd all been chosen. We all had these powers and if we could just find one another and come together, we'd have the strength to beat the Old Ones and give the world a new start."

It hadn't occurred to Jamie that he might still have his power, that it might have returned to him after the shock at Silent Creek. Could he use it now? Could he reach out to Scott? He decided not to try. In this world, Scott was someone named Flint. He didn't want to reach him yet. He was afraid of what he might find.

"There were still people fighting," Scar went on. "People like Finn and Erin and Corian and all the others. There were resistance groups. But they needed us. It's funny, isn't it, but it's like Finn said: They were all adults but they needed five children if they were going to survive. And we needed one another.

So we set out to find one another. And that's how we got here."

"You're not making any sense!" Finn taunted her.

"I'm doing the best I can!" she snapped back.

She turned to Jamie. "Matt told me I had to escape from the mine, so I did. It was very close. I nearly got caught. But it's a long story and I'm not going to tell it tonight. All you need to know is that I got away.

And at the same time, the others were doing the same thing. Flint and Sapling in one kingdom, Inti in another. We were all leagues away from each other. We'd never met. We hadn't even known that the others existed. But we used the dreams to speak with one another, and Matt told us where to go and eventually four of us met close to a river not far from here, on the other side of the hills. Matt is waiting for us there now. Flint is with him."

"Where's the boy you call Inti?"

"He's not there yet. He had the farthest to travel. But he should arrive with the break of day."

"And then…?" Jamie asked the question but he already knew the answer. There was a queasy feeling in his stomach.

"There will be a battle. It's been predicted for ages. If the five of us can reach one another, we will win.

If we can't, the world will come to an end."

She reached out and Finn threw her a water bottle. In that single movement, Jamie saw how well the two of them knew each other. She hadn't asked. He had known what she wanted. And she hadn't looked around. She knew he would have it ready for her.

"How did you find me?" Jamie asked. "The fortress or whatever it was. You came there…and it was like you were expecting me."

"We weren't expecting you," Scar replied.

"Then why were you there?"

She took a long drink, then used the back of her hand to wipe her mouth. When she continued talking, her voice was low.

"It's because of what happened two days ago," she said.

"Tell me!"

"It was Matt." She paused. "I've already explained to you. We had to meet, the five of us, to win. And we were so close. But there was a problem. The Old Ones knew that Inti was coming and they positioned their entire army between him and us. They were searching for him everywhere. You saw the fly soldiers today. Well, there were hundreds more like them, as well as shape-changers and fire riders.

Inti was pinned down. He had to hide. He didn't dare move any nearer."

"How did Matt know?"

"Matt always knows! And two nights ago he called a meeting of the four of us. He said there was only one way to help Inti and that was to send out a small force to a place called Scathack Hill. There was a fortress there and he said that we'd find something that would help us in the fight against the Old Ones.

Of course, Finn offered to go. There isn't a single soldier who wouldn't gladly volunteer to do anything Matt wants. But he said it had to be one of us. One of the Five."

Scar paused a second time, and when she began speaking again, Jamie was astonished to see that there were tears in her eyes.

"We believed him," she said. "Why shouldn't we? He had always been right before. But even so, it seemed crazy — when there were four of us there — to separate once again. But he insisted. He wouldn't let me go. It had to be either

Sapling or Flint. He took them into his tent and spoke to them and an hour later, Sapling came out and got onto his horse and rode off. A hundred men went with him. He didn't say anything to me but I saw his face and I'll never forget his look. It was as if he knew what was going to happen. And none of the soldiers asked any questions. He ordered and they followed."

Her voice cracked.

'You know what happened next," she said. "Scathack Hill was where we found you. The Old Ones must have known about the expedition because they sent a huge force in pursuit. You saw the result. The moment Sapling arrived, they surrounded him and closed in. The battle lasted almost an entire day.

Sapling was incredibly brave. But he was hopelessly outnumbered with nowhere to go. His soldiers died all around him…all but two of them. The Old Ones let them live, not out of mercy, but so they could come back and tell the rest of us. All the soldiers were killed. Sapling was left almost to the end. He was badly wounded but he kept fighting, and the last time they saw him he was leading a charge, trying to break out, to get back to us.

"They cut him down. He took three arrows in his chest but he still kept fighting. But then the enemy soldiers closed in and hacked him to pieces, laughing as they did it. And even when he was dead they wouldn't leave him alone. Some of them cut off fingers for souvenirs. He had long black hair and they cut that off too. Then they built a fire and burned the rest and sent just two men back to tell us what had happened."