The Executioner's Cane (43 page)

From nowhere, someone else stepped in front
of her, someone thin and grey-haired, his eyes wild with a strange
knowledge she couldn’t comprehend. The murderous scribe disappeared
from view, the old man pushing him away from her attack. But it was
too late to do anything to stop herself, the blow was already in
motion. With a great cry, she brought the stone crashing down on
flesh and bone. She heard a splintering sound and then a gurgled
moan, cut off suddenly. The next moment something warm and wet
splattered over her hand and face and she couldn’t help but gasp.
The taste of blood in her mouth, iron and bitter. She prayed the
blood was the scribe’s.

Then she heard his voice.

Simon

“Jemelda.”

Simon felt his father die, his mind ripped
from his fragile body in one overwhelming flood of deep colour
which was there for a heartbeat and then no more. The physical
contact between them as his father’s body lay sprawled on top of
him plunged the sensation deeper within his thought so he would, he
believed, never be free of it. He tasted blood in his mind before
he felt it on his lips and the mind-cane tumbled away.

“Jemelda,” he gasped, somehow dragging
himself to his knees, clasping his father’s body. “What have you
done?”

Her only response was to lunge for the stone
again, her deep fury driving her onward. The next target would be
himself. Simon could not have let go of his father if he had tried,
but he grabbed for the stone anyway, as far as he could see it in
the mist. His fingers touched its rough surface and then slipped
away as Jemelda got there first.

Even though she couldn’t speak, he could hear
the words in her head: This time, this time we will succeed.

She raised the stone above him and began to
bring it down towards his head. Whatever happened, he could not
move fast enough to escape her. And the cane was out of reach.

Annyeke

She could hardly breathe, couldn’t form a
thought, the only image in her mind being that of Johan. She had to
get through this, she refused to leave him. Annyeke Hallsfoot,
First Elder of Gathandria, would not die here, and neither would
those she’d brought with her, as far as she had the power to save
them. When the whiteness fell amongst and within them, Annyeke had
felt her words wash away, along with those of the people and all
she had left were the pictures they held in their thoughts: war,
storm, and winter fields.

One image within was almost stronger than
all, only Johan being more deeply ingrained inside her. She could
see a woman’s hands and a stone dripping with blood. Dread flowed
through her, the need to do something to stop whatever was about to
happen forcing her forward though she could see nothing. Then in
the middle of the screams and terror, she heard it: the clatter and
fizz of what must surely be the mind-cane falling to the floor. She
ran towards it. It would lead her to the Lost One.

The next moment, she could sense Jemelda
reaching for something out of her vision. There was blood
everywhere, she could smell it, and prayed it wasn’t Simon’s.
Jemelda raised a stone high, her thoughts clouded with anger and
crimson triumph.

Before she could fully assess what she was
doing, Annyeke snatched up the mind-cane, hissing with pain as fire
tracked through her skin, and brought it sweeping across Jemelda’s
back. The cook screamed and the stone fell from her hands. As
Jemelda too dropped to the floor, Annyeke could see the searing
flame lining her back. Then the mind-cane’s rage at her own
possession of it overcame every thought and she cried out.

Simon was there in an instant, his face
shadowed and his hands covered with blood but she understood it
wasn’t his.

Let it go, Annyeke, let the cane go.

She couldn’t. It was impossible, but she
couldn’t find the mind-words to tell him. Her palm was wide open
but the cane was melding to her skin and flesh, its power raging
through her, shattering her thought from the inside. It would
swallow her up and she would be no more, she knew it. Simon.

The Lost One’s name was wrenched from her
lips even before she understood it was there. He was holding her
burning hand. Let it go, Annyeke. For if you die, how will I face
Johan again?

Always his humour in the face of darkness.
How she had seen that in him but no laughter rose up inside her
now. Instead the picture of Johan filled her every sense and she
could see the door to survival Simon had opened for her. When she
gasped, the mind-cane rolled from her fingers and landed with a
movement like silk in the Lost One’s hand.

At the same time, Jemelda’s frame loomed in
front of her. The stone was back in her hands and the fire on her
body had vanished. In her mind, Annyeke could see the cook and
someone else also. The essence and hatred of Iffenia, the dead wife
of the Chair Maker, dwelt indeed within Jemelda and, together, the
two women were strong enough to fight again. To fight and to win.
Annyeke tried to cry out a warning, but no words came out. The
terrible pain in her flesh was the only feeling she knew before the
darkness fell around her.

Simon

Annyeke fainted as the skin on her hand
boiled with the cane’s deep fire. Simon cursed his anger out but
the mind-cane’s touch seared a warning into his mind that the First
Elder had tried to give him.

He twisted round, and saw Jemelda, and that
other woman within her also, as she lunged across the ground to
kill him. He had a heartbeat only to make a decision and he made
it. He thrust the mind-cane towards her, his intent true, and it
pierced the skin of her cheek and onwards into her throat. Flame
and death went with it and Jemelda screamed again. The sound of her
cry ripped through him, along with the sudden dousing of her mind,
and then she and the other spirit she carried with her was gone. As
if they had never been at all.

It was then the mist around them began to
sing. Simon had no time to react to the fact he had killed Jemelda,
although the face in his mind for a heartbeat only was Frankel’s,
and then he heard Annyeke. Not with the ear, but only in his
thought: Help us, Lost One, or we will surely die.

He brought the cane back to his body, feeling
the heat and heavy beat of death upon it. He had never used the
mind-cane for such a purpose before and he wished never to do so
again. Now he would use it for life. At the same time, someone
landed at his side with a groan, and fingers clutched at his
arm.

Ralph

Only the emeralds keep his mind fixed to his
body, and maintain his surely useless fight against the force
stealing his words and his memories away, piece by piece. The one
thing he understands is the battle will be with Simon. The scribe
has always been a storyteller, even when he is not writing, and if
this airborne enemy is taking away Ralph’s words, then it will
surely deem Simon’s as more important. Ralph will fight to the end
not to allow this to happen.

So he clutches the emeralds and forces his
way through to where instinct tells him the scribe will be. It
seems to take forever but it can only in truth be a few moments
when his thoughts begin to spark with the scribe’s nearness. A
flash of black and crimson fire and he sees Jemelda outlined
against the whiteness, her mouth framed in terror as she screams.
Then the sound ceases, and Ralph lunges towards the source of it,
where Simon must surely be. His hand touches warm flesh and he
groans with the relief the contact gives him.

Simon. The scribe’s name in his mind is the
only one he knows, and he can’t even remember why he has been so
desperate to reach him, or what the rounded shapes in his other
hand are, but they are linked. They have to be. But how can he tell
the scribe what he should know when he cannot access it
himself?

Simon

With Ralph’s touch, the Lost One knew exactly
what the Lammas Lord longed to tell him. The picture in his mind
was as clear as the sun: Ralph and the emeralds, both of them
offering him the last word he needed to complete his story.

What is it? he asked, making the link to
Ralph complete by grasping the man’s hand. Give me the word you
hold.

But Ralph was beyond reasoning, and his
thoughts were shattered by the mist. Simon could glean nothing and
was terrified to cause more damage by entering the Lammas Lord’s
mind himself. That way might kill him and he would cause no more
death this day. Not if he could help it.

There had to be another way. But what? The
answer came to him along with Anneyeke’s mind-cry: it is over. Help
us!

But not yet, not yet was it over. There were
still heartbeats for them to live. Because the Lost One grasped
Ralph’s senseless hand, took the emeralds he found there and ripped
their master’s word they had kept safe all this time from their
bright mystery: desire.

Ralph’s word was desire. Simon’s mind
swallowed it up, and in it found his own once more: acceptance. As
both words pierced his thought, they joined with those of the
people and created a multi-coloured circle in which everything was
born, dwelt and had its being. A place where there was no silence
but only perfect song, no dissent but only a harmony which came
from the air and the earth and the sky. The colours danced with the
music, and Simon thought he had never experienced anything so
perfect, and knew he would never afterwards be able to describe it
to his satisfaction. Within the circle, pulsating most strongly
with green, the words lived to the full: expanse and grief,
despair, mistrust, anger, bitterness, all of these alongside
loyalty, trust, hope and love. Binding them together were
acceptance and desire.

It was nearly enough. The white mist spat at
the circle but could not enter it. Neither did it vanish and when
the story had finished, the silence would remain to destroy them.
An instinct deeper than words drove the Lost One to his feet,
clutching the mind-cane. As he heard from somewhere within the long
and distant cry of the snow-raven, he glanced down at Ralph and saw
the Lammas Lord’s hooded grey eyes fixed on his own. He was still
there then, somehow.

With a great triumphant cry, Simon the Lost
One swung the cane once more through the dancing circle and the
words within. Fire sprang from the silver carving and the words
flew towards and inside it, forming something far greater than
themselves and far greater than Simon had ever known. As the
brightness and the flame melded into his flesh and thought, he knew
this time his actions were for life, not death, and he understood
this was good.

Then the darkness of pain swallowed him up
and he could sense no more.

Chapter Seventeen: The Music of Words

Annyeke

One moment a chaos of silent destruction
whirled and beat around and within her, the next the overwhelming
pounding which lanced Annyeke’s mind ceased and she felt her
thoughts begin to unfurl once more. And with them words: words of
memories, words of present truth and future imagination. She almost
sobbed aloud at the relief of knowing herself again. When the pain
of loss was at its worst, she had looked up, and seen the Lost One
in the middle of a circle of green, words singing from inside it,
singing through him also. She thought she recognised her own word,
and then the circle exploded into the mist. It was then the mist
vanished, and her world came back.

She fell to her knees, gasping, and
desperately trying to assess the injuries, or worse, of the people
around her. As she reached out with her mind, her eyes were still
fixed on the Lost One, and she cried out a warning as he too fell,
his face expressionless.

“Simon.”

As he dropped to the ground, Annyeke saw
behind him the looming figure of the blacksmith, the crimson of
hatred and revenge swirling round his head. The knife in Thomas’s
hand flashed silver in a sudden burst of sunlight through the
clouds, and she opened her mouth to cry out again. But Simon was
beyond hearing and she was too far away to help him. She could not
bear the thought of her friend dying again and cursed her own
helplessness. Please help him, she prayed, fearing the
pointlessness of it. Please help him.

Ralph

He has nothing left, or that is what he
believes. Simon has the jewels and, as for Ralph, he is spent. This
day-cycle he cannot be the soldier he needs to be. The scribe must
save them from the silence which has no end, if anything can. Then
the darkness falls.

Time-cycles stop and he cannot tell whether
he has been here for a second or a season, but the blackness within
does not fade to white, as he is expecting. Instead, it seems to
take a breath he cannot take and in which he cannot, though yes he
tries, lose himself. From nowhere the darkness pierces his ears and
he flinches as words come hammering into his head: Simon. Please
help him, please …

It is the voice of the Gathandrian elder
which tears his mind from its would-be rest. He cannot tell how she
has contacted him but the anguish in the tone spins him into
action. Simon? He must not die, he cannot do so.

Instinct and anger power the Lammas Lord to
his feet. When he opens his eyes, he sees the grim face of the
blacksmith from the village. He is standing over Simon’s senseless
form, knife raised high, in the act of striking a man who cannot
fight back. Ralph cries out and launches himself at the blacksmith.
He knocks both of them off-balance, away from any danger to Simon.
The blacksmith yells out and Ralph doesn’t need to be a
mind-sensitive to understand his purpose. This is battle and there
can only be one end to it. As the blacksmith turns the knife on
him, Ralph grabs his fighting arm and with one blow twists the
weapon away. It falls to the earth and both men lunge to grasp it.
The blacksmith gets there first, but Ralph’s blood is up and he
kicks the knife out of the man’s reach. This time, Ralph is nearer
and he seizes the weapon. The blacksmith is already upon him, hands
reaching to his throat and in any other circumstances Ralph would
be the loser. But today the gods and stars are with him and he has
already turned the blade towards his enemy. The blacksmith lands on
the knife, the point of it breaching his chest and shattering his
heart. The force of his assault brings the whole weight of him down
on Ralph’s body, but blood spills from the blacksmith’s mouth and a
moment later he is no danger. Ralph hears his own ribs crack, and
pain streaks through him as he is drenched in another man’s
blood.