The Burning Man, page 22
part #2 of Kingdom of the Serpent Series
Veitch’s jaw sagged, and then a barely believing smile leaped to his lips. He whispered to himself, ‘And the crowd went wild.’
‘I dreamed I was in such a misty place,’ Ruth said. ‘Why do I feel like I’ve got a hangover?’
A rush of exhilaration filled Veitch and for a moment he thought he would cry again, for joy this time. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to rush over and sweep her into his arms, but it would not amount to anything, he knew that. He allowed himself one secret grin in the dark and said, ‘Looks like you’ve got some uses after all, Miller.’
Ashen-faced and shaking, Miller came over. He was smiling. ‘You don’t fool me with your act, Ryan. I can see how much you love her,’ he said quietly.
‘Bollocks. What do you know?’
‘I know that somebody who shows so much care for another person that he would risk everything to save her can’t be as bad as he pretends.’
‘If you go on thinking that, you’re making the kind of mistake that could get you killed. I’ve hurt a lot of people to get here. I’m the bad guy, Miller. I know it and I don’t care.’
Miller continued to smile knowingly. It unnerved Veitch, so he went over to Ruth who was sifting through her woolly thoughts.
‘Did the Libertarian do this?’ Veitch asked.
‘I think so … yes. I remember him strangling me.’
‘You died, darlin’.’
Ruth’s eyes widened.
‘Whatever part of you matters went over to the Grey Lands. I’ve been there – it’s not Club Med. You hang around for a bit before you move on to wherever you go after that.’ He jerked a thumb towards Miller. ‘He got to you in time.’ Veitch’s hands were trembling; he hid them behind his back.
Ruth’s eyes narrowed. Something in his words or manner puzzled her. ‘I remember what you used to be like, Veitch. It’s coming back to me.’
Uncomfortably, he looked away to the east. ‘Sun’ll be up soon. We need to move. Those bastard spiders are going to be all over us now. Need to think … where to next? Fuck. I planned this really well.’
The landscape appeared to revolve around him, a vertigo-inducing moment that almost made his knees give way. When it came to a halt, the shadows had altered and were no longer fixed to the light sources, and there was an intense quality to the silence as though the landscape was listening. The Brothers and Sisters of Spiders, Miller, the compound buildings, all were gone.
‘What the fuck—?’ Veitch drew his sword, but the black flames were so subdued they were barely visible.
‘Where are we?’ Ruth looked round, disoriented. ‘I don’t recognise this place.’
‘Knavery abounds. Why, you are pouk-ledden.’ The voice was filled with a sly humour. A second later the Puck appeared.
‘What are you?’ Veitch growled.
‘My names are many, in many lands,’ the Puck said with a sweeping bow. ‘Call me Robin Goodfellow, but do not call me blackguard if you wish good fortune.’
‘Watch him,’ Ruth said to Veitch. ‘He can’t be trusted.’
‘Night wanderers, you are,’ Robin said slyly. ‘And so, by my right, I mislead you. Or not. And therein lies the mischief, for you to divine.’
‘You’re not making any sense.’ Veitch lowered his sword. ‘Like all your bleedin’ kind. Never saw you with the spiders, though.’
‘Robin plays his own game. A long one.’ From behind his back, he pulled a black box etched with gold-filigreed hieroglyphics. He offered it to Veitch.
‘Is that … the Anubis Box?’ Ruth asked with mounting anxiety. ‘You can’t give that to him! It’s too powerful. It controls gods!’
Ruth lunged for the box, but her hands closed on thin air. The Puck was now curling round behind Veitch, the box held aloft. Veitch took it curiously.
‘No!’ Ruth said. ‘I thought you were helping us!’
‘Mischief does not follow a straight path.’
Veitch examined the box. It hummed in his hands as if it was alive, one of the objects, like his sword, that was nothing like it appeared to be. A thought struck him, and he looked to Ruth, who was thoroughly destabilised. ‘Not happy for this to be in my hands? I could just open the box—’
‘Don’t!’
‘Maybe you’d better come along and keep an eye on me, then. In the car, not tied up in the boot. But one wrong move and the lid comes off.’
Ruth’s features grew flinty. ‘I always thought there might still be a little spark of goodness buried in you somewhere. But there isn’t. You’re worthless. And if I ever get the chance to stop you, I will.’
‘You’ll fall for my charm sooner or later.’ He turned back to the Puck, who was circling them like a hunting wolf. ‘What am I supposed to do with this?’
‘It will buy you passage in the most dangerous domain. Now go. More mischief awaits and … Robin is gone.’
Between blinks, Veitch and Ruth found themselves back in the compound where Miller shifted uncomfortably near the Brothers and Sisters of Spiders, unaware they had been anywhere.
Ruth eyed Veitch hatefully, but there was nothing he could do about that. She was still alive and that was all that mattered.
7
The sun rose red and raw behind the olive grove. Ruth watched the trees become stark black silhouettes against the scarlet, and tried to find a path through all that had happened that night.
The death of her familiar left a deep ache in her heart, compounded by fears for what it meant for the future. He had been a companion and an aide for so long she felt as bereft as if she had lost a friend, though there had been times when he had truly scared her.
Her encounter with Dionysus, Pan and the Puck frightened her, too. They were not like any of the other gods she had met – the ‘oldest things’, they called themselves. What did that mean and what did they want? There were so many questions, and so many threats at every turn, that she no longer had any idea what the real agenda was, or what her role in it should be.
Veitch was communicating in his creepy way with the Brothers and Sisters of Spiders, sending them on ahead. Now that he had the Anubis Box he was an even bigger threat; she had to stay with him. She hoped when it came to a head she could count on Miller, but he was almost childlike in his simplistic view of the world.
Movement alerted her to the women trudging down from the grove, naked, blood-stained and dazed. Ruth took Demetra’s arm.
‘Alicia is dead,’ she said in a strained voice.
‘I know.’
‘We avenged her.’ Demetra’s face showed a dawning acceptance of power. She looked at her brown, blood-caked hands. ‘It was horrible. But it was … strength. And defiance. What we discovered tonight … We will not be beaten again.’ She closed her eyes and breathed deeply of the fresh dawn air. ‘There was madness and death, and freedom and life. And we were at the heart of it. This night we awakened … to something else.’
‘The whole world is awakening,’ Ruth said. ‘It can’t stay the way it has been any longer.’
‘You had something to do with what happened tonight.’ Demetra searched Ruth’s face. ‘I do not know what. I do not know who you are, really.’ She hugged Ruth warmly. ‘But I thank you. And I thank you for all that I know you will do. But you must take care. I feel in my heart there is great danger ahead for you, and sacrifice.’
They held each other for a moment until Ruth sensed Veitch watching them. ‘Time to move on,’ he said.
‘Where does your journey take you?’ Demetra asked.
Ruth looked to Veitch, but his dark eyes gave nothing away.
Chapter Eight
THE VICTORIOUS CITY
1
The blue waters of the Mediterranean sparkled in the afternoon sun. At the rail of the cruiser, Veitch peered past the flecks of foam on the churning wake into the cool depths. Once, in a different life, he had seen mermaids swimming alongside his boat. That single glimpse had been a moment of transformation that opened him up to the infinite wonders of the universe, but sometimes he wished it had never happened; nothing had ever lived up to it since.
They were half an hour out of Paphos, heading south, and trying to make up for the time they had lost stealing a boat in a Greek harbour because the authorities had banned all charters to Cyprus. Another hour and a half to land, and then he could divest himself of the Anubis Box, which throbbed dully beneath his arm.
‘Thinking of jumping?’ Ruth had come up silently behind him.
‘You wish.’
‘I could make you, you know. My command of the Craft is getting stronger by the day. A powerful wind, a gentle nudge … over you go.’
‘Do it,’ he said flatly. He could feel her gaze heavy on him. She was struggling to comprehend his mood; he didn’t really understand it himself.
She hesitated, then said, ‘Miller told me how hard you tried to save my life.’
Veitch glared at Miller, who was sauntering in the sun next to the passenger lounge. He saw the murderous look in Veitch’s eyes and darted inside. ‘I might hate you lot, but I hate that Libertarian bastard even more. If he wants you dead, I want you alive.’
He could see in her eyes that she suspected the truth. Feeling raw and exposed, he turned back to the sea. ‘Anyway, I was just paying you back. You could have killed me in London at your flat.’
‘I try to be better than that.’
‘You should have killed me. Tying me up … that was just stupid. Did you think I wouldn’t get free and come after you again?’
‘I thought it would buy us enough time to sort things out.’ She paused thoughtfully. ‘When you caught up with us in Cornwall and tried to kill yourself, and that power jumped from you to Church and me … what did it do? And why did you do it?’
‘Because I wanted to see if the mermaids were still swimming.’
Fire lit her face at the thought that he was contemptuously dismissing her question, but she controlled herself. ‘You’re right, I should have killed you. All those people you’ve slaughtered, all the harm you’ve done … But the fact is, Ryan, despite all that, I still think of you the way you were when we first met. Someone who was selflessly trying to do their best. Someone who cared.’ She weighed whether to continue, and then threw her caution aside. ‘I remember a time we shared—’
‘Stop it.’
She came up sharp at the emotion in his voice, and that stung him even more. He expected her to press harder, but instead she said, ‘Just because you’ve given me my freedom, don’t think I won’t look for a way to trip you up.’ The expression she presented was supposed to be challenging, but there was an odd note of uncertainty in her eyes.
‘I expect it.’
She returned to Miller. Veitch stared back into the depths, but his mind was racing. He sensed deep currents moving in Ruth, and a strange new life within them, but he was afraid to examine them too closely for fear of disappointment.
2
The wind blasted down from the mountains with the cold threat of rain. Behind them, the lights of the Court of the Soaring Spirit had long been lost to the inky night. There were only the bleak, rising foothills of scrubby grassland, outcropping rocks and stunted, wiry trees.
Mallory led the way on horseback, with a lantern hanging from a staff attached to his saddle to guide them over the treacherous land. Sophie and Caitlin followed, heads bowed against the gale, and Jerzy took the rear on a small pony, frightened and jumpy.
Mallory kept one hand on his sword. The countryside all around the court was dangerous, and from the walls they had seen many of the Enemy’s outriders and small, marauding groups. Tension ran high within the alleyways and inns, fuelled by the expectation that it was only a matter of time before the Enemy was at the gates. And what was the queen doing to protect them?
It was a question Mallory had asked himself – and Niamh. But as much as he had questioned her, and spied on her whenever he had the opportunity, she appeared honestly concerned about her subjects and the court’s security. She made no attempt to stop them when they set out in search of the great library of Ogma, which Jerzy had heard about in the Hunter’s Moon; indeed, she barely paid any heed to them.
‘How much further?’ he shouted above the wind.
Jerzy spurred his pony to Mallory’s side. His frightened eyes were fixed on the dark. ‘Something tracks us,’ he whimpered. ‘Oh, master, please deliver us safely. Oh, why come under cover of night? Why not in the beautiful light of day?’
‘Because we’re an easier target then.’ Mallory followed Jerzy’s gaze. Behind them, several dark shapes moved close to the ground, keeping pace with them. ‘So, how far?’
‘A mile, perhaps.’
Mallory beckoned Sophie to his side. ‘Give us some cover. Just something to keep them occupied. Can you do that?’
‘If you have to ask that, you really don’t know what I’m capable of.’ She flashed a grin.
‘That’s what I’m worried about.’ Surprising her, he grabbed her cowl and pulled her in for a deep kiss. ‘For luck,’ he said.
‘Not that I need it.’
‘Not that you need it.’
She bowed her head for a second, and when she raised it her eyes had rolled back so that only the whites were visible. Her lips moved silently. An orgasmic shudder led to a moment of grace and then she gave a spent smile. ‘I wouldn’t hang around if I were you.’
Mallory beckoned to Caitlin, who had carried an air of sadness with her since they had left the Tower of the Four Winds. She smiled wanly and spurred her horse on.
Jerzy whimpered again as he indicated an undulating shadow moving up the hillside behind them. As it neared, they could see it was made up of a multitude of bodies: rats, fat and sinuous. A desperate hunger informed their rabid motion. Jerzy cried out and drove his pony as fast as it would carry him. The others followed, heads down into the wind. The rats surged towards whatever was tracking them, now the nearest source of food.
After about a mile, when the hillside was becoming increasingly rugged, Mallory reined in his horse. The way they had come was clear of any movement. That didn’t mean the threat had gone, but Mallory recognised the opportunity for a breathing space.
‘You enjoyed that,’ he said to Sophie.
‘It was invigorating.’ She threw her cowl off and shook her hair so the wind caught it. ‘The Craft works so well here. It’s such a buzz.’
‘A slight chance we could have ended up as the first meal break for your furry little helpers.’
‘What’s life without a little danger?’
‘Safe?’
‘You need to live a bit, Mallory. All my early years were safe. Middle-class home, middle of the road. But no meaning, in anything. The only time I started discovering what really mattered was when I threw all that in and left home. Travelling all over the country with a group of people all searching for the same thing.’ She stretched and shivered with pleasure. ‘You only discover the truth – about yourself, about the world – when you take risks.’
‘The trouble with risks is it can go either way.’ Mallory watched Jerzy gallop up to them from reconnaissance along the increasingly treacherous path.
‘We are here,’ he said with excited relief. ‘Finally, sanctuary.’
Without Jerzy’s explicit directions, they could easily have missed the entrance. Overgrown with dry, brown bramble and long yellow grass, almost obscured by fallen rock, there was only a dark passage disappearing into the hillside; it looked as if the library was retreating from the world.
Mallory’s horse grew skittish as he led it down the tunnel of dense vegetation until they came to the front porch of a large stone building set into the hillside. Above the porch was a tower topped by a weather-vane in the shape of a dragon. Caitlin tethered the horses while Mallory hammered on the door.
A moment later it swung open to reveal a tall man in robes so white they appeared to gleam with their own light. There was the familiar moment of disconnection while his features swam, but they eventually settled into a high, artistic brow, piercing grey eyes and long black hair and a bushy beard, both streaked with silver.
‘You don’t know us—’ Mallory began.
‘I know who you are, Brother of Dragons. I know your Sisters.’ He eyed Jerzy. ‘I know you, and who you represent. And I know why you are here.’
‘How could you?’ Caitlin asked.
‘I am Ogma, and my library contains records of all that has happened, and all that will happen, if one but knows where to look.’
‘That must really ruin birthdays and Christmas.’ Mallory had kept his hand on his sword, but there was no sense of threat coming off Ogma, just a calm wisdom that made him feel more secure than he had done in a long time.
‘We hoped you would let us use your library,’ Sophie said. ‘And we would be grateful for any guidance you could give us.’
Ogma motioned for them to enter. ‘Everything I have is given freely and without obligation.’ He picked up a candelabrum from a table beside the door and led them into the gloomy interior.
The library stretched into the hillside, a warren of dusty rooms and corridors, niches and vast halls, festooned with strands of silky cobwebs and filled with shelf after shelf of books, parchments, maps and mysterious objects of glass and silver that moved their position between blinks.
The portentous atmosphere gave Sophie a fit of the giggles that she made a poor job of stifling. Jerzy, though, was at peace, gambolling beside them, his fixed grin for once matched by the joyful expression in his eyes.
As they moved amongst the stacks, Caitlin grabbed Mallory’s arm and pointed. Shavi was examining a book, which, when opened, was only filled with light.
‘Shavi!’ Mallory called out. Uneasily, Shavi returned the book to the shelf and walked away.
‘He cannot hear you,’ Ogma said. ‘What you see has already happened – or will happen, in your terms – and the same is true of many of the events you will witness in this place.’
