The Copper Promise (37 page)

‘Tell me about these gods,’ said Frith. He wanted to take his mind off the deadly drop just in front of him, and as bored as he was of listening to Jolnir’s booming, pompous voice, it was a good distraction.

They were perched halfway up the northernmost statue, in a tiny alcove created by the folds of the mage’s robe. The island was enclosed in mists once more, although a gusting wind meant that every now and then Frith could see the rocks below through ragged gaps in the cloud, and the occasional glimpse of a slate-grey sea. Other than that, the only thing of interest in sight was a nest of lizard-like creatures clinging to another ledge, just opposite where they crouched. They were like the lizards in the pools, but bat-like wings sprouted from their bony backs and they slunk around on the sheer rock like they’d been born there. Frith supposed they probably had. Their nests were made from a mixture of sand, seashells and seaweed, and they clung like limpets to the stone.

‘What do you wish to hear?’

Jolnir, much to Frith’s vague annoyance, had experienced no difficulty with the uncomfortable climb up the statue. There was a rough stairway of sorts, carved directly into the stone, although in places it had degenerated into little more than a series of handholds. Frith had not enjoyed it at all.

‘Were they truly gods, for a start?’ He slid the brush across the strip of fabric as Jolnir had taught him, but immediately he saw that he’d done it wrong.
That
curve was slightly too thick,
this
line at the wrong angle. He grunted in frustration and pulled a fresh strip from within his sleeve.

‘You believe they were not?’

‘Gods should be all-powerful, all-knowing, and yet these ones allowed themselves to be trapped in the Citadel. And once they were in there they couldn’t get back out again. I will agree that they must have been very strange, and otherworldly –’ he paused, thinking of the dragon pushing its head up through the rubble of the Citadel – ‘and certainly formidable, but gods?’

Jolnir made a clucking noise within his mask. Even up here, he insisted on wearing it, and in all his days on the island Frith had yet to see him take it off.

‘You must remember that the gods had shared their knowledge with the mages. A foolish thing to do, in retrospect. The spells on the Citadel were very powerful indeed.’ He sniffed, and used the end of his stick to push the scraps of used fabric off the ledge. The wind caught them and they spiralled away into the mist. Frith swallowed hard and returned his eyes to his work. ‘But that is not exactly what happened, anyway. There were five old gods, Lord Frith, did you know that?’

Frith shrugged. This time he almost had the shape of the word right, he could feel it, but a splatter of ink caused the final part to run.

‘Five gods,’ continued Jolnir. ‘There was Y’gia, a goddess of life and growth, a green creature.’ Jolnir’s headdress waggled back and forth. ‘Fickle. And there was Y’Ruen, a force of destruction, but I believe you are familiar with her, yes?’

Frith ignored him.

‘And there were two more, the Twins, they called them, Res’ni and Res’na, but they were boring, and then there was O’rin, a god of lies and tricks and mischief.’ Jolnir’s voice took on a sudden cheery note.
Someone has a favourite
, thought Frith. ‘He was the most human of the gods, the one who spent the most time walking in the markets and talking to people. He liked the stories they made up – such imaginations they had – and the extraordinary lengths they would go to deceive each other. He was the most human, and it was both his strength and his weakness. When the war broke out between the gods and the mages, O’rin spent much of his time observing from the sidelines, only interfering when it was interesting to him to do so. When he heard of the Citadel, built to contain all the mages’ greatest treasures, he was tempted, oh you can be certain of that. But he was also suspicious. So much time amongst the humans had made him cynical and crafty, and he waited and watched while the other four raced to the Citadel to claim the treasures, and was not all that surprised when the mages sprung their trap.’

‘What?’ Frith paused, the brush poised above the fabric. ‘You’re saying he didn’t go in?’

‘That is what I am saying.’

‘But everyone says that all the old gods were trapped inside the Citadel. That it was the end for all of them.’

‘That was what O’rin wanted everyone to believe. He was the god of lies, remember? And it’s not like the mages were going to open their trap to check they had everyone inside, was it, my boy?’

‘What happened to this O’rin, then? Where is he now?’

A cold wind blew across the statue. Frith pulled his bearskin cloak closer around his shoulders, while the birds perched above them chattered irritably.

‘With the gods gone, the Edeian and Edenier began to fade from the world, and so did O’rin. He hid himself away, not wanting a direct confrontation with the mages. He disappeared.’

Frith sat back on his haunches. His legs were aching from crouching in such an uncomfortable position, and he felt damp all over.

‘How could you possibly know all this? All the histories say the mages trapped all of the gods, never that one got away …’

‘There you go, I think you’ve got it!’ Jolnir scuffled forward and laid one skinny finger on the strip of fabric. ‘The form is finally correct! You are not blind and stupid after all.’

Frith looked down. The word was there, and yes, it did look like the examples in Jolnir’s dusty old books.

‘What now?’

‘You know what. Get on with it, lad!’

Frith picked up the bandage and carefully tied it around his right hand, the inky side facing out. It was awkward with one hand, but he was getting better at it.

‘Why do this up here, anyway?’ he said. ‘This could have been demonstrated somewhere more comfortable, or at least at ground level.’

Jolnir hit him with his stick.

‘You must learn to write the words wherever you are! Do you imagine you will always get to write them in the comfort of your study, Lord Frith? Besides,’ Jolnir nodded at the nest of white lizards opposite, ‘I hate those vile creatures.’

Frith got to his feet, mindful of the drop inches from his boots. He held his right hand out in front of him, the palm turned towards the lizards’ nests.

‘Feel the Edenier within you,’ said Jolnir. ‘Coax it into being, and then remember the word. See it in your mind, remember the exact shape of it. Let the word and the Edenier connect, let them come together.’

Frith took a deep breath, and tried to concentrate only on the word, and the mage’s power. It was lying dormant at the moment – he could feel it in his gut, a quiet, restless energy – but the presence of the words seemed to rouse the magic, so that very soon he could feel a tingling in his arms, the strange sense of light building within his chest. He pictured the shape of the word in his mind as clearly as he could, and his fingers began to glow a shimmering orange.

‘That’s it, that’s it …’

There was a sensation of warmth on the palm of his hand, as if he were holding it to a candle, and a globe of fiery light shot from the centre of it, flew across the gap and exploded amongst the nests. Buttery yellow flames crawled over the rock and two of the winged lizards fell smoking into the mist.

‘Yes!’ cried Jolnir. The black birds above him fluttered in consternation. ‘Again!’

Fire
, thought Frith,
the word is for Fire
, and another fireball shot from his fingers to explode against the nests. There was a faint roar and hiss, but little other noise save for the outraged cries of the lizards. A number of young, pale blue and shiny, crawled rapidly from the beleaguered nest only for the fire to turn their limbs black. He sent three more fireballs just to be sure he’d got them all, and then sent a couple out into the mist, watching with fascination as the eerie orange light made the mist shimmer like sunrise.

‘Don’t go mad, boy.’ Jolnir poked him in the back of his leg with his stick. ‘It is potent, the word for fire.’

There was a stinging sensation in his palm, and when he looked down he saw that the bandage where the word had been was now a smear of dark ash.

‘It’s gone,’ he said.

‘Well, of course. The power is destructive, you see, always destructive. But it is versatile. Next I shall teach you the word for Ever, and you will be able to combine the two and create a continuous stream of fire. Ever-Fire.’

Frith looked at the smoking ruin that had once been a thriving nest. As he watched, the last winged lizard struggled out of the remains and dropped to its death, its wings now a pair of scorched sticks. He could smell burned seaweed on the air.

‘I will learn them all.’

The wind escorted Wydrin down the wooden steps to the area her mother had always referred to as the ‘belows’. To one side was a long cramped cabin filled with the sour stink of lots of people sleeping and working in close proximity to each other, and to the other was a slightly wider room filled with sacks and boxes. Gallo was standing in the doorway to the bunks, a pack of cards clutched in one grey hand. Beyond him she could see a number of grotty hammocks and a few scruffy sailors. There was an upended box in front of them with a bottle of rum on it and a number of tin cups. The men were all desperately ignoring Gallo.

‘A quick game of rummy, gents?’ he said again. All of the old Gallo cheer and confidence was in his voice, but it did little to hide the poor state of his skin or the vague scent of putrescence wafting off him. The belows were never especially fragrant areas, and Gallo was adding to the problem.

‘We don’t play with devils,’ said one of the men in the bunks, glancing from Gallo to Wydrin and back again. He had a pair of dice in one greasy hand. ‘Playing dice with the devil, won’t catch me doing that. That’s like something in one of those songs, isn’t it?’

Wydrin took hold of Gallo’s arm and dragged him out of the doorway. The flesh under his shirt sleeve was cold and hard.

‘You’re supposed to be staying with the cargo.’

‘I can’t sit in there for the entire voyage! There’s barely room to sit, and no one to talk to.’ Even so, Gallo let Wydrin lead him into the hold. Having established that none of the boxes and sacks contained anything flammable she’d put a small oil lamp in there, along with an old wooden chair. It was pretty cramped, and it smelled of old fish, but she wasn’t feeling especially concerned about his comfort.

‘My brother didn’t want you on his ship at all.’ She led him over to the chair, and then glared at him until he sat down. ‘Sea-faring men get anxious if a seagull so much as gives them a funny look, so you can imagine they’re beside themselves over a dead man on board. If you don’t behave, I’ll have you put on the other ship, where I won’t be around to stop the men chucking you overboard.’ Jarath had two ships in his modest fleet:
The Sea King’s Terror
and
The
Briny Wolf
, the latter of which was carrying a bunch of jobbing adventurers, intent on collecting the bounty on a certain dragon. Wydrin had rolled her eyes when she heard about that. ‘Very superstitious men, sailors.’

Gallo glared down at his hands, his fair eyebrows bunched together in a knot. He was sulking. Wydrin was quite familiar with that look, had seen it many times during his frequent arguments with Sebastian. It was strange; he looked so much like Gallo. Laughed like him, moved like him, sulked like him. The only thing that wasn’t familiar was the stink. Gallo had always liked to smell good, even when covered in the dust and dirt of adventuring. Now he smelled like a dog left to vomit itself to death in a barrel of offal. She leaned against one of the boxes and folded her arms, staring down at him.

‘Is it really you, Gallo?’

He glanced up at her and said nothing, apparently deciding the question wasn’t worth answering. Instead he kicked the heel of one of his boots against the floor.

‘Sometimes I can’t feel my feet,’ he said. ‘Like I’ve forgotten they’re there, and I have to hit them against something to remember.’

Wydrin sighed.

‘What do you think you’ll get out of this? Do you really believe Sebastian will want to talk to you?’

‘It doesn’t matter if he wants to,’ he replied. In the dim light it was all too easy to see the shape of the skull beneath his skin. ‘There are things he needs to know.’

Wydrin patted Glassheart where it hung at her hip.

‘You know, if Sebastian gives the word, I will quite happily chop you into pieces. Big ones, small ones. I’ll be very interested to see if you keep talking when I’ve separated your head from your neck.’ Certainly, the axe wound he’d taken in the alleyway didn’t appear to have caused him any problems. He’d covered the hole over with a scrap of linen and said no more about it. ‘I’d do it now, in fact, but I think that’s up to Sebastian to decide. It was him you stabbed, after all.’

‘I told you, that wasn’t me! It’s like I was trapped inside, unable to stop it.’

Wydrin turned and walked to the door, ignoring his excuses.

‘Just stay in here and keep quiet,’ she said. ‘And stop frightening the pirates.’

Moonlight streamed in through the narrow window. Outside the night was still, with only a faint wind bothering their sails. Sighing, Wydrin turned over in the bunk, facing the wall with its stained and warped wood. She could hear the sounds of men working on the deck, performing all those small tasks that keep a ship moving swift and sweet. As bunks went Jarath’s was remarkably comfortable – she’d certainly slept in worse places – but she’d been tossing and turning for hours now. Sleep wasn’t coming.

She wriggled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. Where was Sebastian now? Closer, hopefully, than he had been. They had been sailing for days, crawling down the coast of Relios. With the mood he’d been in the last time she’d seen him, there was a part of her that wondered if he’d got himself killed already. Her stomach tightened at the thought, but Wydrin forced herself to think on it. He’d travelled back to Creos alone, without giving her any real choice, and sought out a dragon with little other than the sword on his back. And that wasn’t to mention those sharp-toothed bitches with their shining swords and golden armour. What chance did he have, really? It was stupid. And he’d lied to her too, risking everything to repair his precious honour.