Shadow (40 page)

Stark naked, Far Gaze sat cross-legged on the ground among the wolf fur he'd shed. He wiped tears of mirth from his eyes but at last managed to speak. ‘I smelled much in the night. The wind tells me a huge force comes from the north and crosses the Great Road, still some way distant, but coming. They come to take your city, Tauk the Strong. And then High Cliffs, of course. They bring war machines, siege towers, trebuchets. War mages will come too.'

‘Those foul things will be weak in our city,' said one of the men. ‘There is little magic.'

‘They will use their claws and teeth, and cast at you even if one spell kills them! An army like this has not come to wage death on such a scale since the War that Tore the World. But there'll be far less death than that, for you haven't nearly the force to make a contest of it. They mean to burn and poison the land outside your walls, where your food is grown. Occupying your city is not their instruction. All your people will be killed, their bodies thrown in massive pits. The vanguard of that force will reach your city soon and test your defences. The rest is some way distant.'

The men had been, throughout this, getting angrier and angrier at Far Gaze's glee, which he still did not bother hiding. But Tauk's face showed none of his thoughts.

‘Meanwhile death comes from the south,' Far Gaze went on. ‘It marches with no purpose and no named enemy. But it marches
north.
Do you understand? What we saw and travelled through on this night was just the scattered edge of it! You know of Strategist Blain's men? The rebel faction he sent, to guard World's End?'

‘I do.'

‘More than ten thousand men.
They
are the Tormentors we've met! We learned what those beasts are: men changed by poisoned airs from Levaal South, or airs which become poison when they mix with ours. A massive gust of this poison crossed the barrier. Not all Blain's men were changed, but a good portion was. Several thousands! More Tormentors than were used to take and hold Elvury, you can be sure. Did all this fit Blain's private plan? I know not. But it was not the Arch's plan.

‘Rejoice, Tauk the Lucky! You will only have to defeat the castle vanguard. They'll have likely avoided the Tormentor swarm, as I judge your city shall too. But the castle's main force is two days or more behind the vanguard.
They
will not be so lucky. And Tormentors will be an enemy they're ill prepared to fight. Trebuchets, swords and arrows will not do them much good.'

Siel's heart sped as though it understood, though her mind had not yet grasped it. A wave of talk broke out among the men. ‘Do you mean to say…?' began one.

‘I laughed from unexpected joy, from relief,' said Far Gaze, lying on his back with his legs akimbo. ‘It is a strange world. For the moment – for the
moment,
mind – you are no longer doomed. There is yet a battle to win against the vanguard force, which itself will test you. Get High Cliffs to send support, now! You must win, for the castle will soon lose most of its strength, as the Arch always meant it to do. But he meant it only after
all
Free Cities were ruins and ashes, and all your people dead!'

‘Then we will have won,' one of the riders said sceptically.

‘No,' said Far Gaze sitting up, suddenly more sober. ‘You'll have survived just one peril. Your prize will be a land crawling with death, and a foreign world to your south about which we know nothing. You are close to the barrier. Vous remains on his throne, a god rising. He will need no armies, and you must hope you no longer matter to him. What's more the dragons in the sky are on the brink of freedom, and they mean death to us all. You won't know peace for a long time, if you ever truly do. For the Pendulum swings. You probably do not know what those words mean, and I doubt my explanations will mean much to you.'

If Far Gaze meant to erase any sign of hope or optimism in the men, no spell could have done it swifter. ‘Will more poison come?' said Tauk quietly.

‘Who knows? Forgive my laughter, Mayor, and my one moment's relief, joy, hope. It has been the first I've had in a long while.'

‘You are forgiven, of course.' The Mayor stared into the distance, thinking. ‘A question. Are you familiar with the spell which shares your name?'

Siel saw intense annoyance run across Far Gaze's face; mages were never pleased to be asked to cast something, even by those who were their allies, friends or commanders. He said, ‘I know one version of it.'

‘I understand to cast it requires high ground. Take me to such a place, and cast it for me, if you will be so kind.'

‘If you ask me to look to the south, beyond the boundary, I will not! A greater mage than I was already corrupted by—'

‘Calm yourself, I don't ask that. I wish to look upon these lands. Will you cast it for me?'

Far Gaze spat. ‘Nothing would give me greater pleasure,' he said angrily.

‘Excuse me, Mayor. Have you Engineers?' said Gorb, who had been itching to speak for a while now.

‘We do, as you must know. That one there sleeping, he is one of ours, unless he has acquired those garments in some other way. His clothes come from our city.'

‘A tattoo on his foot will reveal his origin,' said another of the entourage.

‘He is yours. But you might be happy the village I came from borrowed him,' said Gorb. He held up one of Bald's guns. ‘There were two monsters over in that field, back yonder. Got time for a quick show of how these weapons work?'

Tauk said, ‘There's no time for that now, and we will not go near those creatures when we needn't. I need to see with my own eyes what the magician has claimed.'

‘Of course,' said Far Gaze with a sardonic bow.

‘It is no insult, good mage,' said Tauk. ‘But a wolf's nose can't be the basis of decisions I must now make. I will see with my own eyes how things have shifted, if indeed they have. Then maybe I will laugh along with you, for a little while.'

3

They rode half a mile east until they came to a suitable hilltop, then sighted a taller one further away and headed there instead, to Far Gaze's silent fury. He and Siel gladly rode on horseback, but the entourage was not mindful of Gorb, who lagged some way behind them carrying the Engineer. They encountered no Tormentors on the steep winding paths through a dense glade filled with ferns.

(As they rode Siel could still not free her mind of the sight of that Tormentor staring at her. What had it seen? Enemy? Prey? Would some other happenstance mage one day look back from far into the future and see its spiked body swing around with alien grace, hear the rattle of its needles, and wonder the same thing?)

They reluctantly left the horses tied to tree stumps when the path got too steep, then climbed a long-abandoned track through thick foliage and found the highest point they could. ‘Ready?' said Tauk.

‘Where would you see?' said Far Gaze irritably.

‘The land about, as far as you can take me. I have had this cast once before. It showed me many miles beyond, but the mage cooked himself in casting it. I could not eat meat for weeks after.' Some of the men chuckled.

Far Gaze's jaw clenched. ‘A very foolish mage that must have been, not to know certain limitations. I heard a similar tale, in which the magician accidentally cooked the ones he cast upon. Such things can happen. It is a shame.'

‘The Mayor meant no disrespect, good mage—'

‘Shut up! All crowd in. My version of the spell is cast not on one person but over a small area, so several of you will be cast upon. This was once a hunting spell, used to confuse dangerous animals by ruining their vision. The tribes used it. My people altered it and made it more useful. I will be blind. All of you will have “far gaze”. It is safe to speak to me during the cast but do
not
touch me. If you feel any pain, step away and keep your eyes closed till we are finished.' He looked around the glade. There was no sign of recent human activity; the old path was grown over. ‘I am troubled – this place is not safe. One of you stand watch. Go! We'll soon be blind to our surrounds. Enough dithering, I cast now. Shut your eyes.'

He sniffed hard for a minute or two, waiting for some ingredient in the airs. His eyes rolled back in his head; he began a low murmuring in a lost tribal tongue, almost a song, his resonant voice pleasant to hear. Seven of the Mayor's men crowded in around him, along with Tauk and Siel, all smelling of the road, Siel acutely conscious of the Mayor's closeness. She hoped he would bump into her, longed for his touch even if it were inadvertent. The road did that too – made one ravenously horny – and she felt some of the other men standing much closer to her than they strictly needed to; the odd brush of a hand or elbow against her butt or hip. Just now she didn't mind that at all.

Soon Far Gaze's voice was like a physical thing touching her inner mind, the feel of it pleasant despite provoking a need to squirm away. It went on for a while, then, as though the touch had hit on some key spot, all in a rush the hill fell away in a spinning lurch, to the gasps and mutters of the men crowding in.

From high above they saw the land they'd just ridden through, with occasional people and wagons moving along the roads. The land off road was dotted now and then with Tormentors, motionless or stalking along. ‘Take us further afield, if you can,' said Tauk. ‘Hear me, mage?'

‘He cannot answer you, but he hears you,' said Siel.

Now whizzing beneath was the country they had travelled overnight, the road winding like a river. More abandoned wagons could be seen on their sides, sometimes in smouldering ruin, goods scattered over the fields, bodies abandoned. No Tormentors were here, aside from the occasional corpse of one broken in pieces.

It was as their sight flew near the Great Dividing Road and travelled along it many quick miles north that the Mayor drew a sharp breath. There was the horde that had been Blain's rebel force. Each one looked small from the height of their spell's vantage point, so that it looked like a repulsive swarm of insects crawling along. ‘What compels them onward?' one of the men said. ‘Whose order to march do they follow?'

‘No one's. They are wild creatures, not thinking ones,' said another.

‘Yet look, they all head north as though on some mission, obeying some order. The ones who don't move have been distracted.'

‘Nightmare!' Siel said, suddenly realising. ‘It must be him, or the other god at World's End, Wisdom!'

‘Why do you say this?' said Tauk.

‘The gods there were keeping things from crossing the barrier,' she said excitedly. ‘Blain explained it to us. The gods must have somehow compelled these things to flee north, away from the barrier, so they would not cross back!'

‘Surely neither you nor Blain can claim to know the minds of the gods,' said the Mayor. ‘But whether you're right or wrong—'

‘Come back!' the watch-man shouted. ‘Danger! Come back!'

4

Far Gaze ceased chanting. For a little while the world spun crazily around; there was a sensation of falling from high in the air even though their feet were planted. Each of them came to on the ground in a tangle of bodies. The man keeping watch stopped shouting.

When their sight returned it showed Far Gaze frenziedly hurling rocks at something on the overgrown path behind them. Siel was first to her feet. She reeled back from the lone Tormentor which, with ponderous graceful movements, tore apart the man who'd kept watch. The streaks and drops of blood its hands flung through the air made it seem like a composer making music it alone could hear. The thrown rocks bounced off it harmlessly.

‘Stop throwing rocks and fight it!' said one of the men, scrambling to his feet.

‘I am not casting combat spells,' Far Gaze growled. ‘This is your Mayor's fight. We are here against my wishes and I'll not cook myself for you.'

Four men stood with weapons drawn. They hesitated before the Tormentor, having learned in the night how ineffectual swords could be against their hides. One said, ‘Do something, mage, or being cooked won't be your greatest danger.'

A shape crashed through the curtain of ferns drawn about the down-hill pathway. Gorb emerged from the greenery with one of Bald's guns in hand. ‘Great plan, leaving me behind,' he said. He crouched on one knee, fired and sent a shot ricocheting over the beast's head, bouncing through the glade behind it. He put another sharpened stone down the gun's barrel, aimed more carefully and with a cracking sound the shot split a cleave in the Tormentor's chest.

It went still for a moment then resumed playing with the almost-dead man in its hands, as if it did not realise it had just been badly hurt. The other men found their nerve and rushed at it. Their swords rang on its back but did little more than scratch it. The largest of them heaved his two-handed blade with an overhead diagonal swipe and cut off part of the creature's foot.

The Tormentor tilted sideways, off balance. It turned the motion into a graceful sweeping reach for the man who'd cut it. He fell toward its spread hands.

‘Down!' Siel yelled at the men. ‘Stay down! You are in the giant's way!'

They did not get down. Gorb waited as long as he dared for a clear shot then chanced firing again. A part of the Tormentor's head broke off and landed with a thump in the foliage some distance away.

The creature took a few steps then went still but for the curling of its spikes. More sword blows toppled its stiff body over. In the quiet that followed there came the
creak, creak, creak
indicating more of them nearby. ‘Hush!' Far Gaze said. ‘They're drawn by our sounds.'

‘Do something, mage, or you will be named an enemy of my city,' said the Mayor.

Far Gaze looked stunned for a moment, then laughed. ‘If I do nothing, no one will live to spread news of your city's new enemy. No one but me, that is –
I
can escape safely enough. So which is it, Mayor? Do you hate me or love me?'