The Destiny of the Dead (The Song of the Tears Book 3) (59 page)

‘So you found the pure fire,’ he said when everyone had
finished. ‘I don’t know how you did it –’

‘And we can’t imagine how you beat that mighty army at
Blisterbone,’ said Yggur drily, ‘so we’re even. What’s the plan?’

‘We’re waiting to see which army moves first,’ said Nish.

‘If I were a rebel, and had chthonic fire,’ said Malien,
‘I’d let someone else go first.’

‘What if they were rewarded
beyond their wildest dreams
?’ said Tulitine.

‘I’d be working out how I could take the reward away from
them. Or, if they suffered an unpleasant fate at Stilkeen’s hands, I’d quietly
withdraw.’

‘How many armies are down there?’ said Maelys.

‘Five, we believe,’ said Nish, ‘including Vomix’s.’

Maelys moved closer to Nish. ‘I thought he died on Mistmurk
Mountain!’

‘The man we saw there wasn’t Vomix; it was Vivimord
transfigured to take his place. Vomix is alive; I fought the bastard a couple
of weeks ago, and unfortunately failed to kill him, though he very nearly
killed me.’

She clutched at his arm.

‘The others include the present seneschal of Fadd, Lidgeon,’
Nish went on, ticking them off on his fingers. ‘He leads a force only half the
size of Vomix’s, I’ve heard, but he’s a cunning devil. There’s also a private
army that sailed north from Tiksi, led by Hackel. The Jackal, they call him. A
pleasant fellow to your face, but don’t let him get behind you.’

‘Who else?’ said Yggur, lying down and putting his head in
Tulitine’s lap. She stroked his brow.

Nish did not reply for a moment; he was too surprised. He
had not seen his old ally with a woman before, and Tulitine of all people.
Clearly, much had changed in the four weeks since they had been separated.

‘General Nosby, the commander of the Imperial Guard at
Morrelune. It’s fanatically loyal to the God-Emperor and if Father does comes
back, or his appointed deputy, Klarm, every man of the Guard would give their
lives for him. I don’t know what they’ll do if Father really is dead.’

‘Would they transfer their loyalty to you, Nish?’ said Maelys.

‘An excellent question,’ said Yggur, ‘to which we don’t have
an answer.’

‘I’ve heard rumour of one other army,’ said Nish, ‘but I
don’t know anything about it.’

By this time the sun was riding up a clear, brassy sky; it
was going to be a hot day and Maelys was wilting. ‘I’m really tired. If nothing
is going to happen for a while …’

‘Good idea,’ said Nish, yawning. ‘We marched half of last
night and I’m not planning to move before mid-afternoon unless I have to. The
lookouts will warn us if anything happens.’ He rose. ‘There’s a nice, shady
napping spot further up.’

He was looking at Maelys, and she accompanied him up the
slope, though the others remained where they were.

‘You didn’t mention Xervish, after Roros,’ she said.
‘Where’s he gone?’

‘There’s so much to tell,’ said Nish, putting a
companionable arm across her shoulders. ‘He went looking for chthonic fire two
weeks ago and I haven’t heard anything since. I – I didn’t want to
mention it in front of everyone, but I’m worried about what he’s up to.’

‘I don’t understand.’

They settled down in the coolest patch of shade and Nish
went though his concerns about Flydd: his odd behaviour, frequent
disappearances, his apparent obsession with the tears, and, most damning of
all, that he had not made a portal with the serpent staff until he left Roros.
‘Renewal changed him, and not for the better. I’m worried that he’s after the
tears – and not to destroy them.’

‘No!’ Maelys said flatly. ‘He
has
been different ever since renewal, though that’s to be expected
– especially since Yalkara interfered with it. But deep down he’s the
same old Flydd –’

‘How would you know?’ he said quietly.

‘I – I believe in him.’

‘But Maelys, when he took renewal, you’d only known him for
a day. Flydd and I fought together and travelled together for years during the
war, and he’s definitely different now; he’s harder and meaner, and it bothers
me.’

‘Let’s wait and see what happens when he returns.’

‘If he does,’ Nish said darkly.

Maelys frowned, clearly uncomfortable with the topic. She
was the most loyal of friends and had never stopped believing in him, even when
Nish could not believe in himself. It was one of her defining qualities and he
could hardly fault her for it.

‘Is there any news about Klarm and the tears?’ she said hastily.

‘Not since he went into the shadow realm, but if he turns up
the tears could change everything.’ He paused. ‘Tulitine isn’t looking well.’

‘The Regression Spell isn’t reverting the way she expected.
She hasn’t aged, outwardly at least, but the pain in her bones grows ever
worse.’

‘And she only used that spell on herself to save me,’ said
Nish, shaking his head at a generosity of spirit which, for all his courage on
the battlefield, felt beyond him. ‘Yggur looks worn out, too.’

‘His Art is almost gone, and I’m sure it has to do with the
caduceus.’ Impulsively, Maelys took his hands, but realised what she had done
and hastily dropped them. ‘How are you, Nish? You look exhausted.’

‘I am. What a bunch of crocks we are,’ said Nish, leaning
back against a tree and staring at her until the blood rushed to her cheeks.
‘We’re all knackered, battered, broken, or decayed, except you. You’re more
beautiful than ever, Maelys –’

‘I – I – Don’t talk nonsense. The aunts always
told me how little and plain and mousy I was.’ She looked away.

‘Plain? Mousy!’ Nish snorted. ‘What nonsense. How can you
believe anything they say?’

‘They’re all I have left.’

And that was his father’s fault. He changed the subject
hastily. ‘Have you learned anything about
your
gift?’

‘No, and I never will; I’m too old to begin with the Art,
and the lessons Father put into the taphloid for me are lost forever. But then,
I didn’t know I had a gift until a few months ago, so I haven’t really lost
anything.’

The tone of her voice said otherwise.

 
FORTY

In the early afternoon, Maelys was sitting on the
coarse grass with Nish, watching Tulitine, whose head was bowed. She was using
her seer’s skills, aided by a decoction Malien had given her, made from a root
of the black-petalled Aachan daisy, to search for Klarm. Nish felt that the
dwarf and the tears were his only hope now – and a very slim hope at
that.

‘I have him!’ she said suddenly.

Maelys leaned forwards but Nish put a warning hand on her
arm and she sat back again.

‘Catacombs,’ said Tulitine. ‘Very deep, dark; deadly. The
dwarf staggers; his arms and chest run with blood; but he will not set down the
tears. He is gone.’

Her head sagged to her breast and she slept, her breathing
light and fluttering, for ten minutes, before rousing drowsily.

‘I know no more,’ she said as Nish opened his mouth. ‘Klarm
is in the depths of some catacombs, and the time is now, though I can’t tell if
he’s close by or a hundred leagues away.’

‘So he escaped the shadow realm and he still has the tears,’
said Maelys. ‘Your enemies would pay a fortune to know that.’ She got up.

‘Let’s hope their seers aren’t as clear-sighted,’ said Nish.

They went with Tulitine to the edge of the copse and watched
her make her painful way down the gully.

Maelys said, ‘Even if Klarm does turn up, he won’t help us,
will he?’

‘If you were trying to save the world, would you ally with
the weakest army here?’ said Nish, scanning their surroundings and running his
fingers through his thinning hair. ‘Why isn’t anyone moving? Anything would be
better than this interminable waiting.’

‘It won’t be long now. Are you all right? You look
terrible.’

‘My guts are burning like acid and I want to throw up. I’ve
done everything I could do, Maelys; I’ve driven myself to the limits of what
mind and body can take, and I’m afraid it’s not going to be enough. I can’t
bear to think that Santhenar might end here,
today
, because of something I’ve done wrong – or failed to
do.’

‘You can’t take that burden on yourself,’ she said softly.
‘Stilkeen is an immortal
being
– it’s bigger than all of us.’

‘Someone has to. And what if it is the end? How can
beautiful Santhenar be destroyed because of something Yalkara did thousands of
years ago? I can’t come to terms with that.’

‘Surely …’ she began.

‘That’s what it’s come down to, Maelys. It’s not right, but
Stilkeen has roamed the universe for half of eternity. It must have seen a
million worlds, so why would it care about ours? If it gets the pure fire back,
it could crush Santhenar the way you or I might swat a fly.’

Shivers ran up and down her back. ‘There isn’t much hope, is
there?’

‘Between Vomix and the other armies on the one hand,
Stilkeen on the other, and the threat of annihilation from the void, I don’t
see how there can be. And what if it deliberately drew everyone here so it
could destroy all its opponents at once?’

‘Why would it do that?’ said Maelys.

‘I’ve no idea. We’re dealing with a superior being. How can
we possibly out-think it?’

‘We can’t. Yggur lost most of his Art just when we needed it
most, Tulitine can barely walk, you look like you fell out of your own coffin,
and I … we need help desperately, Nish.’

‘We’re not going to get it. We’re on our own.’

Psshhhhffftt!
With
a whispering sigh and a puff of fog that vanished as swiftly as it had
appeared, a glassy, bubble-shaped portal opened further up the slope and a
small, skinny, horribly scarred and incredibly ugly man stepped out. A very
familiar figure that Maelys had never expected to see again – no,
could not possibly
see again.

‘Xervish!’ she cried, for the man looked exactly like the
Xervish Flydd of old, before he’d taken renewal. She began to run towards him,
but stopped. This had to be an illusion or chimaera created by one of their
enemies.

‘Wait!’ said Nish, who had his sword in hand, ‘Who are you?
Stay back, Maelys, it could be Yalkara. She once possessed Flydd, remember?
Stop right where you are,’ he shouted.

‘It’s me, you bloody moron,’ the original Flydd’s harsh and
acerbic voice was unmistakable. ‘Is there another man on Santhenar who could
wear this body with pride?’

Maelys, incongruously, giggled. It was Flydd, of course it
was, and suddenly the despair lifted. With Flydd at their side, anything was
possible, even taking on a
being
.

‘Certainly not me,’ said Nish, sheathing his sword and
looking as though he’d just been relieved of an unbearable burden. ‘If I was
that ugly I’d sew myself into a warthog’s skin and count myself fortunate.’

‘Why you obnoxious little sod,’ cried Flydd. ‘It took me
fifty-six years to look this way, plus the services of the Council of
Scrutators’ ten best torturers. You’re almost as hideous and you can’t be
thirty-five.’

He came down the hill, swinging the serpent staff with the
forked tongue, and Nish ran and embraced him. Flydd returned the hug, though
only briefly, then pushed him off. ‘Let’s not get carried away. I haven’t
missed you
that
much.’

Flydd embraced Maelys heartily and long, and she knew he was
delighted to see her; she also knew that he had a fondness for beautiful young
women and, despite his appearance, had no trouble getting them … at least,
while he had been a scrutator. Before –

Remembering what she’d seen when he had been naked and going
through renewal – or rather, what he had lacked – she bit her lip
and stepped away.

‘Why did you go back to the old Flydd, surr?’ she said
timidly.

‘My renewed body didn’t fit properly, and it was giving me
all manner of trouble, to say nothing of changing me in ways I didn’t like. You
must have noticed.’

‘No,’ said Maelys hastily, ‘not at all.’

‘Liar,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Moreover, the ladies weren’t
nearly as satisfied by the renewed, middle-aged me as they had been by the
scrawny old man I’d been fifteen years earlier –’

‘Funny that,’ said Nish.

Maelys was looking in every direction but at Flydd, her
cheeks hot.

‘– and since the serpent staff allowed me to make
portals,’ Flydd went on, giving Nish a keen glance, ‘and do one or two other
things –’

‘You took renewal again,’ said Nish.

‘I certainly did not; do I look that stupid?’

‘Well, since you ask …’ grinned Nish.

Flydd swiped at his head. Nish ducked.

‘I thought I’d try
reverting
the renewal,’ said Flydd, ‘and to my surprise the staff assisted me.’

‘Wasn’t that a terrible risk?’ said Maelys, remembering the
agony he had gone through during renewal. Flydd had barely survived it.

‘It was, but I was in such pain I didn’t much care whether I
lived or died, as long as the pain stopped. The reversion wasn’t fun either,
and it certainly wasn’t pretty, but it worked. And most importantly, I got rid
of the woman in red,’ he muttered. ‘There’s no one in my mind now except me.’

‘But you didn’t revert to the er,
old
Flydd you were just before renewal,’ said Maelys tactfully.

‘You put it so nicely, my dear. He was on his last legs, no
use to man or beast, so I allowed the Reversion Spell to run a bit longer than
it should have. I wasn’t greedy, mind. I didn’t want to go back to my youth
– I merely returned to fifty-six.’

‘You were older than that when we first met, weren’t you?’
said Nish.

‘A year or two,’ said Flydd, who seemed very pleased with
himself.

‘And, er, therefore you would, must have –’

‘Yes, I’ve got back the
equipment
that the Chief Scrutator’s torturers cut from me that day on the platform
suspended above the rooftops of Fiz Gorgo,’ he snapped, ‘if it’s any of your
damned business. And I’m planning to put it to vigorous use once we’ve cleaned
up the little mess down below.’