The Far Kingdoms, page 31
Deoce sighed relief, then gave herself up to the healer, who had laid out his charms and mixed up a potion for the pain. First he checked her: prodding here and there for tenderness; sniffing her breath; directing candlelight into her eyes. Then my heart leaped as I saw him hesitate... as if puzzling. He gave a barely perceptible shake of his head. Then he smiled, and I imagined it as forced as my own, for I was grinning like an idiot to maintain a cheery appearance.
“A winter’s chill, as we said — isn’t that so, my good sir?” I asked.
Again the hesitation, then: “Uh... Yes... Yes! Just so. A winter’s chill. Now, if you will relax yourself, Lady Antero, and drink this potion. I’ve put a dollop of honey in it to lessen the bitterness, but you’ll still not like its taste. But if you will humor me, please, and drink it all in one gulp...” She did as he said, emptying the tumbler as quickly as she could. “Now you may close your eyes, if you will, my lady, and you will soon be asleep. I’ll cast my spells and we’ll drive those little demons out. Then, as your good husband prophesied, you shall be well by morning when you awake.
I sat beside her as she closed her eyes, taking her hand to give her comfort. The hand was fiery with the fever and her finger joints seemed swollen large. Suddenly her eyes opened. “You’ll watch Emilie closely tonight?” she asked.
“Of course I will,” I said. “And I’ll post Spoto by her bed all the night through. And we have a healer with us, so you needn’t worry on Emilie’s account, if she should catch the chill as well.” I kissed her and her eyes closed again.
“I love you, Amalric,” she murmured. I said I loved her too. “You have been a good husband to me. And a good father to Emilie.” I answered by stroking the hot hand I held. She yawned — the potion was taking affect. “You know... I think Emilie looks... just... like... you.” And she fell asleep.
The healer motioned me back and I sat in a chair in the corner, while he lit the incense pots and sprinkled in the ingredients to cure a winter chill. He chanted an ornate set of fire beads to life, then broke them apart and scattered them around her bed. He tossed in more of the special dust and the dots of lights became a glowing circle. Then he lifted his hands and began to swiftly murmur the spell. But the lights suddenly dimmed and Deoce cried out, but did not awaken. The healer seemed startled by what had happened. He shook his head, then fetched a box with some other powder and sprinkled the dust into the pots. The beads brightened, and the healer sighed in relief; but his relief was frightening to me, for I was forcing myself to believe all was very usual, very routine. As he started his chant again I waited, tense for another cry of pain. None came; instead, Deoce’s features relaxed and I imagined her lips were curling into a smile — a sweet dream, I prayed. The healer droned on and on, and the incense pots filled the room with a heady perfume. Soon he was done, and he got out his little stool, unfolded it, and sat by the bed. He lowered his head in concentration and began to weave another protective spell. I’d seen it many times; even had it performed on me. Yes, it was all quite routine; the usual cure for a common malady. I fell asleep.
It was not an easy sleep, nor was it one I had sought. It was as if a pillow had suddenly filled my head, and I drifted away. The nightmare raged and I visited with the boatman again... and the ghastly man with the gaping eyesocket. Again I climbed those steps and heard the howling and confronted the fate the nightmare carried me to each time it captured me.
When I awoke, the Dark Seeker had come and gone.
Deoce was dead.
I will not desecrate her memory with mewling descriptions of my feelings. I can only write that I have known such desolation, such pain, only one other time in my life. It did not scar me, for a scar does not have a lingering memory to it; a ghostly presence, as if your heart were a limb and you could amputate it, but still live.
I do not remember much of what happened next. The healer wept for his failure; but his tears fell on the cold plain of my hate for him. Rali came to give comfort and to see that Deoce’s body was properly tended, and a preserving spell cast so she would stay fresh until the funeral. I recall my sister telling me others were ill and that all who had fallen ill had died. Her words had no meaning to me; did not penetrate my numbness. It seemed like years passed, but it was not much more than two days. I spent the whole time with Emilie. We played in the garden — she could walk, now, in a toddler’s fashion; and she could say “Da” and “Mama.” I said Mama had gone on a long journey and would not be with us for many a day. Instead of crying, she clung to me more; not for her own comfort, I think, but for my own. Finally I roused myself. There were things to be done; a funeral to plan. But was like coming up from a second sleep. In the first, Deoce had died; in the second, I awakened to find the Dark Seeker and his minions raging all over Orissa.
It was a plague like no other that had touched our shores. It ravaged through the city, unchecked by any spell the Evocators could conjure up. Rich and poor alike were felled. There was no logic to it. Whole neighborhoods were devastated, but in some, no one was harmed. In others, a single family might fall ill and die, while their neighbors huddled in their homes in terror, but in good health. Sometimes only one member of a household might be stricken, while the others were untouched by anything but grief. The sickness did not produce horrible pustules and sores, but struck out with awful pain and fever. Some lingered... some died at the first stroke.
The city was crippled by fear. All shops and businesses were closed; the river empty of traffic. The Evocators gathered in emergency session and combed the scrolls for some clue to turn back the plague’s wrath. But it raged on without relief. There were no public funerals, for all were too fearful to come out into the open. I buried Deoce on our grounds and made a small ceremony with Rali and the villa’s staff.
As the days passed, I kept waiting for the Dark Seeker to return — anxiously peeping into the eyes of Emilie and my servants. Outside, the fever burned on; but, still we were spared further grief. I don’t know how many died during this time; perhaps two thousand; perhaps more.
On the night of the first snow, Emilie awakened, shrieking with pain. I rushed to her, pushing aside Spoto and A’leen. Emilie cried louder when she saw me and I pulled her into my arms and held her tight — trying mightily to force away her pain with my own will. She clutched back, crying, saying: “Da... Da... Da.” I gave her a potion to make her sleep and I bathed her slumbering little body in icy water to lessen the fever. It did no good. I held her all the night, rocking back and forth, humming her favorite child songs. I knew it was pointless to fetch a healer, but I was frantic to do something, anything.
Then I remembered Halab’s cure when he brought me and my pet ferret to life. I rushed out into the snow, found the home of a vendor of pets and hammered on the door like a man possessed. I gave him a fistful of coin for a small animal in a cage and rode hard for home. I searched in my chamber and found the ferret tooth necklace Janos had given me for protection during our journey. I took it, the cage, and Emilie to Halab’s altar, where I made a bed for her on the floor. I draped the necklace over her and prostrated myself before the altar.
“Dear brother,” I said, “you have helped me before and I beg you to help me now. Emilie is dying. She is your niece, and you would be proud to see what a brave little Antero she is. Oh, come to me, Halab. Cure her of her pain. Send the Dark Seeker from my door.”
Halab’s face peered down from the painting. I imagined I saw a great sadness in that face, as if he had been touched by my plea. I took heart and got the ferret from its cage. It was wriggling with life and its eyes were small beads of curiosity. I placed it in Emilie’s sleeping hands.
I looked at Halab’s image. “Come to us, brother. Come to us, I beseech thee.”
Suddenly the room grew dark. I felt a shadow pass. Emilie moaned, but the ferret stayed quite still; only its whiskers twitching to show it was not a stuffed toy.
A voice came to my ear: “Amalric.” I knew it was Halab and my heart leaped with hope. A light shone from nowhere, and settled over Emilie. I smelled an odor of heavy incense.
Halab’s voice came again; a whisper: “Emilie... Emilie.”
Emilie stirred. She opened her eyes and smiled when she saw me. The ferret moved and Emilie looked down and saw it. She giggled. “Da,” she said. “Da.”
I wept with relief. “Yes, dear,” I said. “It is for you. A ferret, like I had when I was a boy. Ferret. Can you say it? Ferret.”
“Ferret,” she responded, quite clear, as she added a new word to her small book. Then she closed her eyes and gave a great sigh. Her hand fell open and the ferret scampered away. One more long sigh... and she died.
I roared with grief and pain. I threw myself on her small body, pleading that it wasn’t so, couldn’t be so. I wanted to die myself; for what reason could there be to go on? All I cared for, all that gave me purpose, had been torn from me.
Then I felt the presence hovering near, and Halab’s voice calling: “Amalric.” I looked through streaming eyes and saw his form bending over me; cold smoke, wavering, but firm in its shape. The ghost’s lips opened to speak. He whispered, but with great effort: “Sorry... So, sorry.” His hand floated forward and touched my face. There was no substance to the touch: it was not cold; it was not warm; it was just there; a comforting breath on my cheek.
The whisper came again: “You must not... stop. You can not... surrender.”
I wanted to cry out what was the use? What was the point? The wisp of his touch stroked my face. “Heal, brother,” he whispered. Then: “Sleep, Amalric... Sleep.”
I slept. It was the sleep of the dead, for no one could rouse me. The servants carried me to my room and put me to bed. They tended poor Emilie, burying her in the garden beside my wife. Six days later, I awoke. The grief was a knot of numbness in my chest. I wanted to cut it out with a knife; but when such dark thoughts came to me, I remembered Halab’s plea. I obeyed, but with great difficulty. I ate. I drank. I crept through my sorrow day by day.
Outside in the city there was joy to be mixed with all our sorrows. The plague was gone. The Dark Seeker had fed, and fed well; now he was satiated and Orissa was safe. But it didn’t matter to me, one way or the other. Dead or alive, sick, or well, I did not care what fate awaited us.
Then, late one night there came a knocking at our gate. Everyone was asleep, worn out from caring for me and my family, so I went to see who it was myself. I flung open the gate and gave a start. A ragged, injured man sagged against the gatepost. It was Sgt. Maeen.
“Sergeant,” I gasped in surprise. “Where have you come from? What has happened?”
Maeen answered, his voice a harsh rusk: “It’s all gone to ruin, my lord. To ruin.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
THE SERGEANT’S TALE
“What happened,” I demanded. “Where is he?”
“In... in Lycanth,” Sergeant Maeen managed. “In their dungeons. Or, worse...” He stopped abruptly, and I turned and saw my servants gathering around, gaping. I quickly led Maeen into the house. I gave orders for food and wine, and for no one to repeat anything they’d heard; knowing the last order was in vain. Maeen tried to continue, but I told him to be quiet — unless his story would require action within the hour. Maeen was grim. “Not an hour, Lord Antero... nor a day. Perhaps not ever.”
I half-carried Maeen to a guest chamber where food and drink was already being set out. I had three of my most trusted men keep close attendance on him while he ate like a starveling, drank down a flagon of wine, and then collapsed. Grinding my teeth, trying to be patient, I let the man sleep for four hours, knowing there was nothing to be gained by shaking him awake. I ordered his tattered clothing burnt. I also noted he had arrived weaponless, and knew something terrible must happened to separate this soldier from his tools. When Maeen awoke he was bathed, massaged, and brought to my study. I poured him a restorative herbal drink, sat down behind the desk and bade him tell his story in any manner he saw fit. I expected a barely-coherent babble, but I should have thought better of the good sergeant — and of the training he’d received from Janos.
Exhausted, seemingly in shock, Sergeant Maeen reported most succinctly: “Lord Antero, the Second Expedition to the Far Kingdoms has been destroyed. We were annihilated by sorcery from without... and from incompetence from within. The sole surviving officer, to the best of my knowledge, is Captain Janos Greycloak. He is currently being held in Lycanth as a prisoner. I do not know where or under what charge — he gave me an opportunity to make my escape when we were arrested, and therefore cannot be more specific.”
“But Janos lives?”
“Unless the Lycanthians have executed him, or tortured him to death, I would think yes. Their soldiery took great pains when they captured us to avoid harming the Captain.”
Now I told him to begin from the beginning, and tell me everything, no matter how damaging. He did so. Maeen was no bard, who would have begun the tale of the expedition with a doleful statement of purpose, of how the gods turned their faces away before the first sail was set. He did not need to make the point so obvious as he talked about how, from that first day, things had gone wrong. The ships had been overloaded and, once they reached the river mouth and sailed onto the Narrow Sea, it was clear they were of the wrong type. Too many of them were shallow-draught river barges or hastily-converted coastal traders.
Bad weather struck, and although it was less severe than the Archons’ Tempest that had been sent against the Kittiwake, the fleet was scattered. The ship the officers were on, which included Janos and Sergeant Maeen had been one of the first to make landfall, not many leagues from the Shore People’s grounds on the Pepper Coast. “That was the only luck the gods gave us,” Maeen added.
It had taken several weeks for the rest of the fleet to straggle to the Shore People’s village, and five ships were never seen again. The expedition had laboriously unloaded: horses tossed over the side and expected to swim to shore; small boats planked across and used as barges; and even long lines of soldiers used to pass-along lighter items from grounded ships to shore. Finally the expedition was on land. By that time there had been several incidents between soldiers and the Shore People: several of their women had been assaulted; there had been a few brawls; and some of the expedition’s supplies had been stolen. It had taken all of Janos’s’ diplomacy, and Black Shark’s reasoning, to keep matters from becoming worse. Maeen, heading the guard platoon for the expedition commanders, was privy to most of the meetings. He told me General Versred had said this was so much nonsense — the Shore People were not worth the time.
Eventually the expedition lumbered off, roughly following the same path as my Finding; roughly, since there was no way a host of nearly two thousand men could follow the same paths and trails we did, nor live off the land as we had. Their insistence on carrying luxuries like tents, two commissaries (one for the men, one for the officers), and full wardrobes also slowed the travel. Their freight wagons also dictated the route. Maeen told me five or six of the officers had brought female “friends” along; and these friends could not be expected to travel afoot. The horses themselves were an irritant, much more skittish and choosy about their rations than our asses, and requiring more attention. Men began dying even as the expedition moved through that pastoral, abandoned land we thought parklike — dying of errors, disease, and ignorance. Twice the expedition became lost and had to retrace its path. This I did not understand — what were their Evocators doing? The sergeant said it seemed their spells were blocked or sent awry with an even greater severity than Cassini had suffered. I asked about the relict, the scroll from the Watcher. It had worked just intermittently. The most reliable guide was a copy of the map I’d drawn. And what of Janos? Janos had become interested in one of the officer’s “friends.” The officer seemed not to object to the attentions paid his inamorata. Sergeant Maeen said it seemed Janos was traveling with only half his mind on the journey, but “perhaps he was reserving his strength for the wasteland.” I remembered Janos’ lassitude among the Rift tribe, but said nothing.
Maeen said the expedition cut a desolate path nearly a league wide as it went. Like the locusts of his youth, he went on, except that he remembered locusts traveling more rapidly. They reached the river’s headwaters and moved into the desert. I asked if they’d been harassed by the slavers or their sorcery. Maeen said they had not. I asked if the Evocators’ powers had returned, and he said not to any noticeable degree.
Then he looked around the room nervously. “Perhaps, Lord, you are aware of Captain Greycloak’s... interests?”
“You mean sorcery?”
“Yes, sir. He had one of the tents set aside for his own use and spent much time in it. When he did I was ordered to mount a guard about the tent, and to alert him if any officers or Evocators approached. It’s my belief, sir, the reason we weren’t struck by magick in that place, as we were before, was the Captain’s doing.” There had been no sign of the Watchers, either.
The expedition had avoided the Crater, Sergeant Maeen continued, although he had thought of using it for a resupply base. I found my teeth on edge, imagining what this horde of soldiery would have done to the paradise Deoce and I had found. Then I nearly wept as I realized once more, as if for the first time — as I did every hour of every day — that my love had gone beyond forever. But I showed no expression on my face, except interest in Maeen’s tale. Janos had changed his mind not from any romantic concerns, but because he feared the crater’s spell was too strong, and if death visited that paradise again it was likely the expedition would suffer awful casualties in repayment. Besides, they had enough provisions and water. There had been no thought of seeking the Rift — there was no way the valley could have supported the expedition, even though there were now no more than fifteen hundred in the party.
The wasteland was a drear nightmare, but it did not bother Maeen since he knew eventually there was an ending to the barren. They’d followed Janos’s and my path through the foothills, but now the problem was the season was growing late — autumn had already come on. Perhaps, Maeen wondered, this was where the worst of their troubles were sown. Janos seemed to wake from his lethargy the closer they drew to the pass and behaved as if he were a drover, wanting to physically lash the expedition on to greater and greater speed. Maeen shook his head at that — “I understood what the Captain wanted... but there wasn’t any way to put grease under the ways. Maybe if we’d been a smaller party, carried less baggage, been better trained...” he let his voice trail off. “I had the feeling, meaning no criticism of the Captain and his ways, he wasn’t being listened to anymore; that the General and the other officers thought he was ranting like a fishwife. You can only kick a beast that size so much, you know.” Janos, General Versred and his staff had determined to force the pass before the first snowfall. Once on the other side, they could seek winter quarters.
