“So we just lie in wait for him here,” I say.
“Mmm.”
“How do you even know he’ll come this way?”
“Because this is the ford. A horse and cart can’t cross safely anywhere else.”
This river is smaller than the one that runs through Bridgehold: a tributary that descends from the mountains to the north-west, passes the Iron Fortress and meets the main river just west of the town. We’ve followed it south, and for most of the way, the banks were steep. Yet here, they ease down to almost nothing. There’s even a muddy track leading away from the ford in the direction of Bridgehold. Fabithe is right: the cart he saw is bound to take this route.
“Can we at least give him some money?” I ask.
Fabithe’s lips twist. “I think you’ve misunderstood the fundamental principles of theft.”
“You once told me you don’t steal from people who can’t afford it.”
“He’s heading for the town to sell whatever’s in that cart. By definition, he can afford it.”
“Come on. It isn’t like he’s got a whole train of carts. He isn’t one of those people you hate …”
“Northerners? Noblemen? People who try to guilt me into parting with my hard-earned coin?”
“Mercators. And,” I say loftily, “I don’t call playing cards a very difficult way of earning money.”
“You try it.” Fabithe pulls one of the knotted strings of coins from around his neck and drops it into my hand. “There. Satisfied?”
“Thank you. And yes, I know – ” as he seems about to speak – “it’s a loan.”
He snorts. “As if you have the slightest chance of paying it back.”
“Fair point.”
“Seriously, though, my money’ll not last forever. What are we going to do, after we get Toralé out?” If we get Toralé out, his tone conveys. “I know you think we’re going to fight Ifor, somehow, but you know what he has that we don’t? Money. Also power, influence, and a shitload of soldiers. We try fighting that, it’s as good as suicide. Else I’d have done it already.”
“Yet you promised Oriana you’d stand with her,” I say softly, and am rewarded with a scowl.
“Stop spying on me! One’s blood, Alyssia – ”
“I didn’t mean to. And it wasn’t you.”
All the same, our banter doesn’t keep going after that. Fabithe conceals himself behind one of the stunted trees that grow around the ford, looking out for the cart, and I sit with my back up against another and try not to fret. This will save us time overall, I know. Yet now we’ve settled in to wait, I can barely contain my urgency. Toralé is still a long way off.
Even as I fidget, I feel a tugging in my mind. I flinch, expecting it to be Toralé, since I was just thinking about him. But instead –
Luthan opens her eyes to find Oriana sitting beside her. The red-haired girl smiles, but Luthan reads wariness in her expression. Perhaps even a hint of fear, though that seems unlikely. Why would she be afraid?
“How are you feeling?” she asks, touching the back of one hand to Luthan’s brow.
“Fine …” Though Luthan can’t remember why it’s a relevant question. She sits up, mentally prodding her body for clues: slight nausea, but that’s about it. Then she notices the dark walls around her, the broken windows and the dusty mosaic floor. “Where are we?”
Yet even as Oriana answers, Luthan says it with her: “The Iron Fortress.”
She gazes at it all, drinking everything in. The walls are made of firestone, with an outer skin of metal; firestone is the only kind of stone aligned to Fire, instead of Water, so it provided a good alternative to solid iron walls, which would have been far too hot. This must be the Great Hall, with its beautiful picture floor showing people and dragons working together to wield the element of Fire for the benefit of all. Somewhere beyond the fireplace will be the stairs to an empty Inner Shrine. The dragons used to reach the Ruby from above …
Luthan knows all this. She never thought she’d see it in real life.
“Was there truly a jewel here once?” Oriana asks, following her gaze. She nods.
“The Ruby controlled Fire, just as your Sapphire has power over Water.”
“Then what happened to it?”
“No one knows,” Luthan says. “One of your husband’s ancestors invaded Castellany, long ago, seeking the power of the elemental jewels for himself. His mages destroyed the Fortress and slaughtered every last man within, but they couldn’t find the Ruby.”
“Whereas I provided Ifor with a far easier path to the power he sought …” Shaking her head as if to drive away bitterness, Oriana asks, “Do you remember how you got here?”
“Not really.”
“We were trapped in Bridgehold by Diamond Blades. You …” She hesitates, then says in a rush, “You made them leave us alone.”
Luthan’s hand flies to her throat, but the birthstone illusion she has preserved since that first night in Oakelm is gone. It was simple enough to maintain even in her sleep, a constant trickle of power to keep her safe. Yet here she is, scarred neck exposed. Oriana’s gaze keeps straying to it, then shying away again. And yet she isn’t running –
You made them leave us alone.
Guilt hooks its claws beneath Luthan’s ribcage. What she did avoided breaking the five laws, but only just. She didn’t take their memories, as Alyssia suggested; she only created an overwhelming suggestion that she and her companions were unimportant, causing the soldiers to walk away and – naturally, in time – forget it had ever happened. So any harm she caused was more than outweighed by the fact that she avoided a potentially lethal brawl, preserved Oriana’s freedom, and maintained their chance of rescuing Toralé. Surely that was for the greater good.
Yet if she is honest, there was also pleasure in it. She didn’t know it would be so easy, to touch a man’s mind without him even noticing; to influence him into changing his course. It makes her feel that she could do anything. Convince the others to trust her. Persuade them to like her. Force them to give up their blood and believe they did it of their own free will …
Luthan shivers. She can see, too clearly, how the road from here to the Otherpower is no more than a series of small, easy steps. It felt good to leave the town unhindered. To know her friends couldn’t have escaped without her. If she lets it, that feeling will lead her to bend the laws further and further until, finally, they break. Because although her compulsion did not cause any lasting damage to those soldiers, she took away their free will. To remain fully true to her father’s teachings, she should not have done that. And she will not do it again.
Still. Oriana knows what she is – that explains the wariness. To be honest, she expected worse. But it doesn’t explain why –
Wait. I was stabbed.
Her hand goes to her side. Yet her probing fingertips find nothing: no bandage, no soreness, no blood. Lifting her shirt, she peers down at her skin: no wound. Only a scar.
“The blade was poisoned,” Oriana says. “You were going to die.”
That seems undeniable. She would have been weakened as it was, from the complexity of the magic she’d woven. The power she’d drawn from her own blood. Add poison to that as well, and she wouldn’t have stood much chance. So how –
“I healed you,” Oriana says.
“How?”
She explains. And as Luthan listens, she can’t keep the smile from her face. Because this is amazing. It’s how healing used to be, back in the Third Age – back when magic was accepted as a force for good. Luthan has read about such things, but she never expected to experience them outside books. Which is probably the exact same way she feels about me.
“So,” Oriana says finally, the hint of a quaver in her voice, “was it magic? What I did?”
Luthan shakes her head. “Yours is a gift that requires no bloodshed. An act of balance rather than transformation. The priests might look askance at it, but they would find it hard actively to condemn.”
“I am not sure it will ever happen again, anyway,” Oriana says. “But it was like … I had the power to do something perfect. Unimaginably perfect. Like the whole world came together and I could see how it was meant to be …”
Luthan smiles. “It will happen again. If you have a gift like that, it’s with you forever.”
Oriana returns the smile, her expression soft and hopeful. Once again, her gaze settles on Luthan’s scar, and this time it doesn’t shy away.
“You haven’t asked,” Luthan says, “but I want you to know … I’ll never take your blood. Anyone’s blood. I’ve sworn an oath against it, and I won’t break it. I promise.”
Oriana nods.
“Alyssia said you would not hurt us,” she says simply. “And I believe her.”
“Here he comes,” Fabithe says. “Are you ready?”
I blink. “Yes … yes, I’m ready.”
Still dazed, I stumble out from behind the trees and lie down in the middle of the muddy track. Now I’m down here, I’m almost entirely convinced the driver is going to run me over. When I begin to detect his approach over the rush of the river – the rattling of the cartwheels, the jingle of the horse’s harness, the splatter of the mud – I close my eyes. Don’t squash me.
To my intense relief, the cart stops before it reaches me. I hear the driver’s boots hit the ground. A hand shakes my shoulder.
“You all right, lassie?”
The question ends in a shout. I scramble to my feet in time to see Fabithe take the horse’s reins and set the cart moving again. The driver starts towards me with a scowl, but I draw my knife and he backs away, fear creeping into his eyes.
“We’re sorry.” I press the string of coins into his hands. “This is an emergency.”
Then Fabithe pulls me up beside him, and we’re off back to the Iron Fortress as fast as the old grey carthorse can move, leaving the driver staring after us.
With the horse and cart, it takes us two days to travel from the Iron Fortress to the border. Not that it’s much faster than a walk, I don’t think. But the carthorse’s slow, steady plod is designed for stamina. It keeps going through the mud, through the rain, without complaint. Even in the dark, we’re able to travel by the light of the moons. And so we take it in turns, sometimes resting or sleeping on the cart, sometimes walking alongside. Every so often we come across a little stream, where the horse can drink and eat some of the food it’s pulling in its own conveyance; for a few hours during the night, we stop to let it sleep while we shelter under the cart. Gradually, we make up the day we lost. And every so often, out of nowhere, I feel Toralé wake up again. I feel the pain.
Consent is easy enough to coerce, Tarrith told him, and it seems he’s willing to do whatever it takes to force Toralé to become what he wants. His link. I still don’t know what that means, exactly, but it adds a new urgency. Because whatever’s involved, if he tortures Toralé into it, I doubt there’ll be any going back.
Finally, around noon on the second day after we left the Fortress, we arrive at one of the watchtowers that mark the edge of Castellany. It’s a squat thing, built according to functional rather than aesthetic principles. The walls are made from slabs of grey stone, with only the occasional arrow slit or spyhole to break them. Right at the top, I can just make out a vast iron brazier where a beacon-fire might have been.
“What was it for?” I murmur, gazing up at the tower. Although plants climb the walls and the arrow slits are crumbling, it still gives the impression of watchful eyes.
“They were built five hundred years ago, during the same war that destroyed the Iron Fortress,” Luthan says. “To give warning should the northern army try to invade this way.”
“The builders reused stone from the walkways,” Fabithe puts in. “Which probably made sense at the time, but doesn’t make our lives any easier.”
“Walkways?” I echo.
“The Duskmire is covered with pools of water, overrun with gigantic plants – you can’t travel on the ground. So someone Ages ago built the walkways: bridges, of a kind, but bigger. I doubt they ever had sides, or rails, but since the towers were built they’ve been full of holes too. We’ll need to be careful.”
“Then the horse – ”
“Has to stay behind. Only way through the Duskmire is on foot.” Fabithe strokes the horse’s nose. Oriana, Luthan and I spent a good part of yesterday debating what we should call the horse, with Fabithe refusing to join in because there’s no point naming an animal we’ll only have for a couple of days. Yet after we ran out of ideas, I heard him murmuring to the horse. Of course they couldn’t name you. You already have a name, don’t you, Hilu?
Apparently hilu means silver in the Western tongue. Also apparently, Fabithe likes horses better than he likes most people.
We unharness the horse and feed it once more. We’ve already separated the goods that were in the cart into useful and not useful – and let me tell you, Alyssia, Fabithe said after we’d done it, this lot is worth far less than you made me pay for it. Horse and cart included. The cart itself will have to be left where it is. Fabithe thinks the horse will find its way back to the nearest settlement. I hope he’s right.
While the others strap on their packs and prepare themselves, I step closer to the watchtower. I’m feeling unsettled, and I’m not sure why –
Once again, Ifor knocks on the door to Cinemand’s study. “You wanted to talk to me, bride-father?”
“Yes.” Yet for a long time, the old man does not speak. Ifor reins in his impatience and waits in silence until Cinemand says, heavily, “You were right.”
“About what?”
“I have received word from one of my informants. They were seen in Bridgehold, three days ago, fleeing covered in blood.”
“They?”
“Oriana, and …” Cinemand shoots him a nervous glance. “And a man.”
Ifor smiles – or rather, shows his teeth.
“Bridgehold,” he says. “Six of my men were attacked in Bridgehold, three days ago. None of them have yet recovered enough to explain what happened. Do you think it might possibly be connected?”
Cinemand shifts uncomfortably under the pointed sarcasm. “Oriana would not – ”
“Not her. Him. He is vicious enough for it.”
“You – you know who he is?”
“Oh, yes. My visit to Easterwood told me that much.” Briefly Ifor touches his inside pocket, making sure the contents are still secure. “I call him the Dark Knife. He is quite capable of murder, if it suits him.”
“You do not mean – surely he will not – ”
“Hurt her? Perhaps, if he thought it would spite me. What can I say? She walked into it of her own free will.”
“But – then – where is he taking her, Ifor?” Cinemand quavers. “Bridgehold is Diamond territory. Beyond it, nothing but the northern border.”
Good question. It is a shame Ifor has been unable to track her again; the blood is too old, now, to be used as a channel. Still, he keeps his true thoughts on the matter to himself, offering instead, “No doubt he seeks to leave the country and make it harder for us to follow.”
“Then – ”
“Then what?” Ifor does not need to inject a savage note into his own voice; it is there, as real and red as blood. “The truth is clear. Oriana has betrayed you. She has betrayed me. What choice do I have but to dissolve the marriage, break the treaty, and leave you to deal with the Emerald and the Diamond however you see fit?”
“Ifor, please …” The old man clutches his arm. “Do not do this. We will get her back. The Sapphire will be yours. I will even abdicate in your favour, if that is what you want. But if Northfell is seen to withdraw its support, you know it will leave us vulnerable.”
“Abdicate?” Ifor flings back at him, though he is exultant. Yes. Give me the Citadel. I will take everything from her, everything she does not deserve. “What use is a throne without a wife? Without children to continue my line?”
“You lay together in the Sapphire’s light.” Cinemand’s voice trembles with the force of his desperation. “Most likely your heir is already growing within her. And once she discovers it … she will come home. I know she will.”
A baby. Ifor had thought the ritual mere superstition, though one that gave him the opportunity to claim the Sapphire as his own. Let its light fall on you and the goddess will grant you children, filled with the power of the royal line. To one who knows the true nature of both the Sapphire and the goddess herself, it sounds like nonsense. Yet if there is truth in it … A baby. That would tie her to me beyond anyone’s ability to break.
“I will give you a year,” he says. “At the end of it, I will take up my position as Highest Lord of the Sapphire with Oriana by my side and our child in her arms, while her lover bleeds to death in the dust. Either that, or I will abandon the treaty and leave the Citadel to fend for itself. Do you agree?”
A hint of alarm enters Cinemand’s eyes. “My dear boy – ”
“I have given you my patience,” Ifor says. “But I cannot be patient forever. A year is a long time for a man to wait while his wife betrays him.”
The old man bows his head. His shoulders shake.
“What you said before – about blood magic – could that still be true?” he mumbles finally. “That Oriana has been … ensorcelled?”
“Perhaps.” Ifor allows the concession to soften the tone of his voice, to offer a glimmer of conciliation. “We cannot rule it out. And that is the other reason I am giving you a year. Because if there is a mage behind this …” One hand clenches into a fist. Three days. In three days’ time, I will arrive at the Retreat to oversee Toralé’s execution, and that will be the end of it. Without all four of her shields, the Mage will not stand a chance.
“It gives us time to find them,” he finishes softly. “Find them, and destroy them.”
I look round for Oriana. I have to tell her. Have to. Because I didn’t say anything, last time I saw through Ifor’s eyes, and as a result, she learned of his lies through a northern soldier who believed he was dragging a faithless woman back to her husband. This is important information – information that affects her directly – and it isn’t as if I owe Ifor any loyalty. I have no reason to keep his secrets as well as everyone else’s.
I just don’t know how to start.
Closing my eyes, I press the heels of my hands to my forehead. Back when I was only an observer, being pulled into their heads from another world, I used to wish I could do something about what I saw. Yet now I’m actually here, everything is so complicated. The responsibility of it is a constant weight. I don’t know what to share with whom. I don’t know what’s right. And more and more frequently, now, Toralé’s pain is there at the back of my mind. Reaching out to me. Trying to pull me in.
We have to hurry.
“Are you all right?” Oriana asks. Lowering my hands, I meet her gaze – but once again, my courage fails me. No time now. I’ll tell her tonight.
“Yes. Let’s go.”
At a steady jog, we cross the border. To begin with, the difference between Castellany and the Duskmire isn’t obvious. It looks as if the system of plants that characterises the Duskmire has retreated, leaving signs of its former tenancy like flotsam washed up on the beach by high tide: the rotting shells of giant plants, the occasional clump of spindly flowers, a few slabs of cracked stone. Yet gradually, the foliage becomes lusher and denser until we’re completely immersed in it. Some of the plants are taller than trees, with leaves the width of lorry wheels, meaning our route is both shady and almost completely sheltered from the rain. Flowers grow everywhere, of a variety and brightness that’s like nothing I saw in Castellany. I spot insects and birds, flashes of jewelled colour, signs of life I didn’t realise I was missing. Even the soil is different, heavier, creating a thick black mud that clings to my boots.
I’m just beginning to wonder how Fabithe knows where he’s going when we emerge at the top of a small cliff. A series of crumbling ledges provides the only way down into the wide basin of the deepest Duskmire: a featureless sea of greenery, save for the glimmering river and the dark blur beyond it that must be the Castle Retreat.
“We have to climb down there?” I ask doubtfully, and Fabithe nods.
“This is why we carry rope.”
He proceeds to issue a series of instructions that make me question, not for the first time, the usefulness of the Lakeview curriculum. For years I’ve been studying grammar and algebra and the lives of long-dead kings, when what I should have been learning was how to find food in the wilderness, how to light a fire … and how to climb down a cliff in relative safety. First he makes sure that we’re all wearing gloves and that we don’t have any loose clothing that might get caught. Then he gathers all our bags, including his sword, and lowers them to the bottom on a doubled rope, before pulling the rope back up by one end. After that, he locates two sturdy plant stems – as thick as tree trunks – at the top of the cliff, and wraps a rope around each one so that there are two double lengths hanging down.
“Right, then.” He turns to look at us, eyebrows raised. “Who wants to go first?”
“I will,” I say quickly, before I can lose my nerve. He shows me how to loop one of the double ropes around my body so that I can use it to control my descent. He takes the second rope. Then we set off down the cliff.
As it turns out, the worst part is leaning out over the drop to begin with. Once I’ve started the descent, it isn’t so bad, as long as I don’t look down. Fabithe is beside me, advising me on where to place my feet; although the rope burns wherever it’s in contact with my body, my thick clothes and gloves make it bearable. When we reach the foot of the cliff, he directs me to stand well away, before heading back up to help the next person.
Once Oriana and Luthan are down, and Fabithe has made his third descent, he tugs on one end of each rope to bring them down too. Then he stops to catch his breath and look around. We’re on a solid patch of ground, but it doesn’t extend far ahead. The path picks its way across marshland, descending into a hollow before rising up as a vast bridge that stretches into the distance. Similar bridges are everywhere, spanning mist-shrouded pools of water and tangles of foliage. The plants are larger here, too: leaves taller than men, flowers the length of my arm, stems with the girth of tree trunks. Snakes coil hissing around the smaller branches, and occasionally a splash and ripples disturb the tranquillity of the nearest pool; apart from that, the only sounds are the constant whirr of insects and the whisper of the rain.
On the far side of the bridge – which, with nothing to either side but a long drop, felt more dangerous even than the cliff – we find a clearing where one of the larger plants has been uprooted, leaving a dry hollow with a canopy above that’s thick enough to keep out the rain. By now the light is fading, so by mutual agreement we stop for the night. While Fabithe and Luthan set up camp, I take Oriana aside on the pretext of gathering firewood. My heart is racing. I don’t want to hurt her, or lose her friendship. I’m afraid that what I have to say will achieve both.
“I saw something,” I blurt out. “Your father – ”
She looks up, face bright with excitement. “You see through his eyes, now?” But at my silence, her expression changes. “Oh. You mean – ”
“I’m sorry. Believe me, I don’t want to be in Ifor’s head. But I thought you should know what I saw.”
She wraps her arms around herself, shoulders tense. “Go on.”
And so I tell her. How she and Fabithe were seen in Bridgehold. How Ifor threatened to break the treaty. How Cinemand promised to abdicate in his favour. At the end of all that, I take a deep breath before finishing with the hardest part. “They – they think you’re pregnant. Is that – I mean, are you – ”
I’m making such a mess of this. I stop talking and put an arm around her. She rests her forehead against my shoulder.
“I am not sure,” her muffled voice says. “Not yet. I have been trying not to think about it.”
“I’m sorry,” I say again.
“It is how I was conceived. In the light of the Sapphire, on my parents’ wedding night. That is how true Bluepeace heirs are made.” A tremor runs through her body. “But if the goddess was there with Ifor and me that night, surely she knew I was not willing.”
“Yes.” I stroke her hair, hoping desperately that she’s right. “Of course. Yes.”
We stand in silence for a while. Finally Oriana lifts her head to look at me. Her eyes are wet, but her smile seems real enough.
“Thank you,” she says. “For telling me.”
“I wasn’t sure if it was the right thing. I didn’t want to hurt you – ” But she’s shaking her head.
“I would rather know,” she says. “Even if it hurts.”
After that, we really do collect firewood. Fabithe speaks softly to Oriana, asking if she’s all right. Luthan and I roast tubers over the fire. Then we all lie down to rest – but I can’t sleep. Every time I turn over, fresh pain ripples through me as though the movement is setting it off. Not my pain; Toralé’s. And when I close my eyes –
“Wake up, Toralé.” A hand strikes him across the face. A hand wrenches his head to one side. But I only just fell asleep.
He opens his eyes, blinking painfully. It’s dark, but Tarrith is holding a lantern. He sets it down on the floor, then straightens, casting his own face into shadow.
“No rest for you tonight. We are running out of time.”
No. Stop it. I roll over, covering my eyes – right, Alyssia, as if that’s going to keep him out. All that time I spent on Othitali, wishing to be given just a glimpse of Toralé, and now …
Curling into a ball, I try to concentrate on something else. The sound of the rain on the leaves. Stay out of my head. The smell of the earth. I’m sorry, but I can’t help you if I overwhelm myself with your pain. The feel of the fabric around my shoulders –
A loud click. Tarrith is opening his case of tools. That’s never good. As usual, Toralé’s muscles tense instinctively, ready for flight – and then, also as usual, dull realisation seeps through him as he remembers the truth. Even if he could run, it wouldn’t make any difference. Tarrith doesn’t have to be able to see him to hurt him.
The mordathe takes out a pair of pliers. He places the little finger of his own left hand between the jaws, up to the first knuckle. And then, slowly, he begins to squeeze –
I sit bolt upright, shaking all over. Oriana and Luthan are asleep. Fabithe looks up from tending the fire.
“Can I keep watch for a while?” My voice trembles. “I can’t sleep.”
“If you like. You all right?”
No. I nod. “Fine.”
He lies down. I take his place by the firepit and stare at my hands wrapped around my knees, gripping each other hard enough that I can feel all the bones. Hold on, Toralé. Don’t give in. We’re coming.
Time passes. My tiredness creeps up on me. I stand and circle the camp, but it’s cold and dark. In the end, I give up and return to my seat, resting my head on my knees. My eyes are sore. Maybe if I close them, it will take the edge off –
The blood still oozes from the stump of his finger. Toralé can feel it, hot and thick. His entire hand throbs. His entire body. Who would have thought something as tiny as the topmost joint of a finger would cause so much pain by being removed?
And that was only the first one.
“Give in,” Tarrith says. “You and I both know you’re not strong enough for this.”
I should do it. The thought drops into Toralé’s mind, colder and clearer than anything else he’s thought for days. Why go through all this agony, just for the privilege of being allowed to die?
But at the heart of him lies something even colder. Even clearer. And it says, I won’t give Tarrith what he wants.
The mordathe reads his silence. Lips tightening, he picks up the pliers and positions them against the next finger along.
“All right,” he says. “Then we’d better try again.”
“Alyssia!” Someone’s shaking me. I drag my eyelids open, not sure where I am.
“What’s happened?”
It’s still night. Firelight flickers nearby. Oriana’s face beside me is warmed by its glow.
“You were screaming,” she says.
Slowly, I lift my head from my knees. Oriana is crouched next to me. Beyond her, Fabithe and Luthan are both watching. I woke everyone up.
“I’m sorry.”
“Was it Toralé?”
“Yes.” I rub my eyes. “They want him to … well. It doesn’t matter. But they hurt him all the time. And the closer we get …” I swallow. “The more I feel it.”
Silence. Then Oriana covers my hand with her own.
“We will get there in time,” she says. “I promise.”