Drogoya: Book 3 Circles of Light series, page 36
It was as well that Volk was alone – he presented an unprepossessing figure. Mouth agape, clothes stuck with hay, hair on end and wild eyed. He heard laughter again and pinched himself, hard, to see if perhaps he’d dozed off and was having another crazy dream. He rubbed his leg where he’d pinched it and reluctantly admitted to himself that he must be awake.
‘Who are you?’ he managed to croak.
‘You know full well old man. You must reach those children tomorrow. They are exhausted, terrified, hungry and one is hurt. They have walked from Syet.’
Volk closed his gaping mouth with a snap. ‘Quite a walk,’ he replied with masterly understatement.
‘They have gone too far to the north and are nearer to the higher pass than the lower on the Gara. You must find them tomorrow.’
‘Special are they?’
‘All children are special.’ The voice sounded chilly. ‘But yes, one of these is very special.’
‘Do they know that I’m coming? Surely they’ll hide, or have you told them?’
There was such a long pause, Volk wondered again if he’d dreamt the conversation.
‘I – cannot risk direct communication with the girl. Cho Petak can sense two powerful minds linking, but he would pay no attention to us speaking as we are now.’
There was another, shorter, pause before the voice spoke again.
‘Their names are Tyen and Mena. If you think they are nearby, hiding from you, call their names. Tell them you come from Finn Rah, and the Oblaka, and they will trust you.’
Volk sneezed as the smell of mint filled the hay loft. He cursed and sneezed alternately until he fell suddenly asleep.
High on the western shoulder of a spur of the Gara Mountains, Mena wriggled free of Tyen’s still sleeping body. A north wind poked icy fingers through the rags which were all that remained of her shirt and trousers. But at least she was slightly better off than Tyen. She had been better fed and clothed when they fled the Menedula and more used to living in the countryside than a town or a city.
Their journey was taking longer than she’d hoped. Twice they’d had to hide when groups of creatures – she couldn’t believe they could still be called humans – had blocked their direct route. Cries and shrieks ahead gave them time to hurry to the side of their chosen path and creep into rocky hidey holes. The second encounter delayed them for a whole day when eleven such creatures settled themselves for a prolonged halt below where the two children lay hidden. The smell of meat cooking was torture to them, although Mena knew she wouldn’t have been able to eat any of it – stars knew where such creatures obtained their meat. Tyen had buried his face in his arms and shivered and shook with both fear and hunger.
They had been two days without food by then and that had been three days past. There was plenty of water – a thousand tiny streamlets cascaded and muttered down from the retreating snowline, but Mena knew they must find food in the next few hours. And three days ago Tyen had slipped and fallen some way down a scree slope, wrenching his knee badly.
There was sufficient light now for Mena to see what she hoped was the pass shown on her map. They would have to climb perhaps five hundred paces or more through thin snow to reach it and she had no idea if the trail then dropped down to the other side or meandered on at that high level. She looked down at Tyen’s thin face and tugged his arm.
‘Come on. We’ve got to cross the pass as soon as we can now. Come on Tyen. We must be nearly there.’
Tyen moaned but struggled up to stand wobbling on his left foot. His right knee was swollen and bent to keep his foot clear of the ground. Mena pulled his arm across her shoulders and gripped his waist. Somehow she dredged up a smile.
‘You can do it Tyen. We’ve got this far, we’ll soon be safe.’
It took until midday for them to reach the entrance to the pass and as they moved onto the flatter ground a wind screamed through to batter against them. They were ankle deep in brittle snow and the wind hurled grains of the snow against them, scouring their unprotected skin. Tyen stared into Mena’s eyes.
‘Get us through as quick as you can. Drag me or leave me, but we can’t last long in this.’
Tears had frozen his dark lashes into clumps around his eyes and Mena knew it was the pain from his leg as much as the vicious wind that caused his tears. They struggled forward, half bent against the force of the wind, and rounded a bend in the rock canyon. It was the sudden easing of the brutal gale that made them pause and look up. Another fifty paces and the ground seemed to fall away. Mena tightened her arm round Tyen.
‘We’re nearly through,’ she began, when they both heard a noise.
They looked at each other, their fear written on their faces.
‘Is it a bird?’ Mena whispered.
Tyen shook his head, concentrating on the sound. ‘It’s a song – everyone knows it.’ He looked to Mena to explain this oddity.
Mena struggled to make her brain function.
‘Whoever it is, they must be all right. Those other – things – just made noises, they never whistled songs.’
They stared at each other, then Tyen pushed her away slightly and leaned against the ice covered rock wall.
‘You’ll have to go and see. You can run back if it’s something bad.’
Mena took two steps on, then both children froze again.
‘Children! Can you hear me yet? Tyen and Mena! I’m Volk come to find you. Be not feared, I’ll take you to Finn Rah!’
Mena glanced back at Tyen’s trembling form and hurried on to the end of the pass. She peeped cautiously round the last high rocks and stared down. A man, so portly that she was amazed he could climb so high without just rolling off the mountain, was plodding up towards her. He halted, his breath puffing out in white clouds, and looked up. A huge smile split his face.
‘There now,’ he said in a tone of enormous satisfaction. ‘Old Volk found you then, didn’t he? Come little one, where’s the lad?’
Cho Petak sat in his hidden room near the place where the Weights of Balance hung in their impossible suspension deep in the Menedula. He breathed with difficulty, his lungs bubbling with fluid. He was calm now though, after a brief and previously never experienced bout of despair. Faced with the rapid failing of this body at last, Cho had panicked to think of actually having to unbody. He remembered Grek’s acid remark that he, Cho, had been too long embodied. In his spasm of panic, he had flung out a command for Grek’s immediate attendance but he had been unable to locate him. And the recent disappearance of the child from the Night Lands had enraged Cho, making his ancient heart trip in its failing rhythm.
He was now calm and thinking rationally. Used as he was to a human body, he would have little difficulty taking another. He gave a cough of amusement thinking of the contortions of those bodies possessed by his released servants. Such long years – centuries – they had been bodiless and had forgotten how restricted movement could be when one’s essence was confined within such a cumbersome frame. No, he would have no problem taking another body for his use, but he was undecided whether it would be wiser to do so or not.
There might be difficulties now – so many humans in the immediate area at least, had either been taken over or, more likely, destroyed. If he sought a still fit body further afield, it would take time to make it walk back here, and he needed to be here for a while yet.
That female child must have perished. He had found no sign of her mind signature in or around the Menedula for a distance of twenty leagues, and she could never have travelled further than that. There was no indication that any of the maddened populace had found a way in to the Menedula, therefore the child must have somehow slipped out. Again, he had searched the gardens with every means at his disposal but found no clue to where she’d crept away. Once outside the Menedula’s protection, she would be an easy catch for any hungry predator. An annoyance, but of little real importance to Cho’s plans.
Rhaki, that fool with an overweening sense of his own brilliance, caused him increasing concern. Yesterday, Cho had not been able to block Rhaki and thus communicate solely with D’Lah. He reluctantly suspected that Grek had been correct: D’Lah was too long entwined with the other’s essence and Rhaki was now apparently the stronger of the two. That would have to be dealt with before too much longer.
But now he must summon enough energy to move this wreckage that housed him and let it die somewhere else than in here. The Sacrifice levered himself to his feet and crept to the door. He tottered along the passageway, leaning frequently against the black walls to suck some air into his tortured lungs. The final door, and he sagged against the jamb. Unbodied, he would be unable to press fingertips to the secret trigger mechanism to reopen this door. He closed his eyes in exasperation then fumbled at his belt. The ritual knife hung as always from its silver chain, and his gnarled fingers seemed to take an age to pull it free.
At last he unhooked the knife from its chain and dropped it on the floor. He pushed it with his foot between the door and jamb and let the door close against it. He jiggled it briefly until the blade’s tip was all that protruded. He nodded and murmured a soft string of words in a language of another world and the slightly misaligned door edge shimmered. Now anyone coming in here would see a smooth wall, even looking with power such as Offerings or Observers could command.
A final struggle to get to his official reception room and Cho let his body slump into a chair. He took a last gasp of air and freed himself from the flesh he had forcibly sustained for all these centuries. He was momentarily disorientated and had to concentrate on maintaining his position beside the corpse of that once strapping farmer’s son. Seeing how he must have appeared to others caused him amusement. That body really had become disgusting. Already it appeared to be shrinking, deliquescing as he watched.
The disorientation became a flash of euphoria. He had forgotten how it felt to move wherever he wished, whenever he wished, without having to anticipate the pain such a movement inevitably brought. Abruptly he stilled from the wild whirl he’d allowed himself. He summoned Rhaki, and sent another command for Grek. There was work to be done, and at the most, Cho had calculated that there would be only two sidereal years in which to do it.
In the Oblaka cave system, Observer Soosha was sipping hot tea when he began to choke. He leaped to his feet, shaking his scalded hand in the air and trying to speak even as he spluttered. Finn Rah stared from her bed but before she could say anything, the door flew open and Lyeto burst in.
‘He’s got them! He is some way west of Valoon, but he has them!’
‘Babach approaches!’ Soosha finally gasped out.
Sarryen sank back onto the stool from which she’d half risen and stared at both men then at the woman in the bed. Finn Rah’s eyes glittered with sudden tears.
‘Volk?’ she asked Lyeto. ‘Volk has really got them safe?’
Lyeto’s usually serious face split into a huge smile. ‘We found them just now. They sort of popped into view, as if they’d been shielding. Can the girl shield?’
Finn grunted. ‘Light knows what she’s capable of. She saw me remember, when I far sought her, and that’s unheard of.’
She looked at Soosha who was still standing, eyes unfocused. She bit her lip, loathe to interrupt when he was clearly mind speaking someone. It was only a moment though before he blinked and nodded.
‘Babach comes with a companion. And Dragons bring them.’
‘Who comes with him – Voron? Chakar?’ asked Sarryen.
Soosha shrugged. ‘Neither. A female from the Night Lands. Babach would not speak for long. He is worried that the Dragons will be located if Cho Petak does another seeking.’
‘The viewing ledge is wide enough for two Plavets,’ Lyeto put in. ‘It will not be difficult to enlarge it further – the back wall is part of the common room.’
Finn Rah opened her mouth then closed it without speaking. She could only pray that Dragons were better mannered than those ghastly birds. Soosha nodded approval of Lyeto’s suggestion and the young man left, the door banging behind him.
Finn scowled. ‘I feel so useless stuck in this bed,’ she muttered.
‘Well, it’s where you’re staying – at least until the dust has cleared from Lyeto’s attack on the wall.’ Sarryen replied tartly.
Finn remained silent and the Kooshak knew how hard she was struggling to adjust to the fact of how ill she now was.
‘We’ll take you there as soon as we know Babach is near,’ she offered as some comfort.
Finn managed a smile. ‘That would be good of you.’
Sarryen rose and crossed to the bedside. ‘I will tell Melena to attend you Finn. I am going to meet Volk.’
Finn lifted her thin hands and let them drop again to the coverlet. ‘I can’t stop you, and truth to tell, I think one of us should go, and clearly I can’t. Light knows, Volk might already be pouring one of his brews down their throats.’
Sarryen nodded and smiled, although her heart ached to see the Offering brought so low. Impulsively, she leaned to kiss Finn’s cheek, turning away immediately towards the door.
‘Light send, I will be no more than three days.’ She smiled over her shoulder at the Offering. ‘And then you will see these mysterious children.’
Sarryen wasted no time, packing her travelling medicine sack while she instructed Melena closely on the care of Finn Rah. She was tying her cloak when she saw Melena’s expression.
‘Melena, you are more than capable of nursing Finn for a few days. If you are worried, call Arryol. She is much subdued, but should she get difficult, you just get difficult right back at her. Don’t think of her as the Offering Finn Rah but as an ordinary, stubborn, and very sick old lady.’ She grinned at Melena’s dubious face. ‘Just keep her supplied with books and any gossip you hear. The more scandalous you can think of – or invent – the better she likes it!’
The Kooshak laughed aloud now. ‘Oh Melena! It’s only for a few days. Now go along to her and think of something really rude to say about someone!’
And Sarryen was rushing down the passage calling to Lyeto. Melena turned the other way, towards Chakar’s sitting room now occupied by Offering Finn Rah. Squaring her shoulders and taking a deep breath, she opened the door.
Lyeto sent a young student running to bring Sarryen one of the few horses hidden along the slopes of the hillside and by the time she’d spoken briefly to Arryol, the horse was saddled for her. Lyeto had assured her that the way was clear, at least around the outskirts of Oblaka town, so she made good speed, trusting to Lyeto’s word.
She reached the lowest slopes of the Gara that evening and, with clouds obscuring stars and moon, she dared not risk laming the horse by travelling on. She was on her way again before dawn, probing the area all around her as she rode. It was midday and she’d stopped to let the horse drink from a stream when she heard hoof beats and the rumble of a familiar voice. Her pulse suddenly thundered in her throat and she felt a nervousness she’d not experienced since her student days. And she was only meeting Volk and two children for Light’s sake!
Sarryen had regained her usual composure when Volk’s bulky figure atop a horse came through the trees.
‘Greetings Kooshak!’ he called at once. ‘Young Mena said someone was just ahead.’
Sarryen saw that Volk carried one child across his horse’s withers but she only glanced at him. Her eyes were drawn to the small figure riding the second horse and leading the third animal. Hair so fair it was nearly white, a triangular face – broad across the brow and tapering to a small chin. But the large eyes held Sarryen transfixed: a blue so dark it was almost purple, and fully silvered. And yet she was clearly still a child, thin and small, maybe ten years old Sarryen guessed.
While she’d been staring, Volk had drawn level with her. Sarryen dragged her gaze from the girl and looked up at Volk. He held out the blanket wrapped boy.
‘Bad wrench to his knee. I just left it be, didn’t want to do no extra hurt to it,’ Volk explained.
Sarryen took the child, horrified at how little he weighed. She knelt, laying him on the ground and pulling the blanket away from his face. Black eyes under tangled black curls snapped up at her and the boy gave a hesitant smile.
‘You a Kooshak then?’
‘Yes I am,’ Sarryen smiled back at him. ‘My name’s Sarryen – what’s yours?’
‘Tyen. And she’s Mena.’
Tyen struggled to sit up and Sarryen realised the girl had dismounted and was kneeling at the boy’s shoulder.
‘Hello Mena,’ Sarryen spoke as calmly as she could manage. She received an amazingly beautiful smile which lit up the girl’s face.
‘Hello. Can you fix Tyen’s leg?’
‘I can try. At least I can make the pain less for the rest of the way to the Oblaka anyway.’
It was late afternoon the next day when Volk led them up the meandering trail to the great boulder which marked the entrance to the caves. He dismounted as two students came out to take the horses. He reached up to take Tyen from Sarryen’s arms and she too dismounted. She looked down as Mena tugged at her arm.
‘I will stay with Tyen when you mend his leg, but first I have to see Finn Rah.’
Sarryen opened her mouth but Mena was already running into the caves. Students turned and stared as a small, unusual looking child raced unerringly through the labyrinthine passages to hurtle through Chakar’s sitting room door. A strong smell of mint followed behind her.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Pachela fled from the High Speaker’s study and hurried to the covered gardens in search of Speaker Lashek and the strange little man who apparently travelled with the great Dragon Fenj. She ran down paved paths, peering along side turnings until, with relief, she saw the two men bent over a small propagation area. She gripped an arm of each as she reached them.
‘Fenj will surely die if he follows the plan he has made.’
Lashek frowned, his brain racing. Lorak stared down at his grubby hands.
