The Bone Mask Trilogy: (An Epic Fantasy Boxed Set), page 22
“Please, just speak with them. They seek the Shrine.”
Wilatt broke off a word, lowering his hands. “Do they? You poor souls.”
“Good luck and keep him on track,” Tanija said as he slipped out.
Hardly encouraging. Ain moved deeper into the room when Wilatt waved his hands. “In, in.”
“Thank you for speaking with us,” Ain started.
“You won’t be when we’re done, young man. Who’s your friend, he looks old enough to have more sense.”
“This is Schan of the Snake Clan and I am Ain, Pathfinder from the Cloud Oasis.”
“A Warrior? Where’s your Engineer then?”
“He did not pass the Wards.”
Wilatt nodded, moving to the chair. He tapped his fingers on the arm but did not offer to find a space for them to sit. “Shame that. Do you have his keys at least, whatever maps he carried?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” Wilatt paused and shook his head. “Actually no, doesn’t matter what you have. I won’t draw this out. You’re going to die, the both of you.”
“What a relief,” Schan said. “I was getting tired of all the anticipation.”
Wilatt scowled. “Well it’s the truth, Snake. I know. It’s what happened to all the ones they send on the ridiculous Search. I was once a searcher.”
Ain straightened. Ridiculous? Impossible maybe, but not ridiculous. “The Search is important. It is the only thing that will restore the Clans.”
Wilatt gave a sad smile. “Are they broken then?”
“No. You know what I mean. To Sekkati.”
“And why does that matter?”
Schan frowned. “It’s our rightful home.”
“You don’t like your current home?”
Schan shook his head. Wilatt pointed to Ain. “What about you then? Unhappy in the desert?”
“It is my duty.”
“Ah.”
Ain took a deep breath when Wilatt didn’t continue. Despite this unhappy man’s nature, the Sands had blessed them, putting him on their path. No-one was supposed to return from the city. Wilatt had survived... reasonably intact. “You can help us. You’ve been to the city.”
“Bah. Of course not. And no-one can help you, least of all me. Couldn’t even help myself.”
Ain’s shoulders dipped. “Then can you tell us what you know?”
“It ‘aint much.”
“More than we have now,” Schan said.
“Well, I don’t remember so much.” He rubbed his wrists. “That’s the way of it now that I’m old.” He looked up. “But I was a Pathfinder. Let’s see, let’s see. Everything went well enough, we both survived the Wards and both crossed the wasteland. I came here for water, just as you did, though it was a quieter place back then. Fewer runaways living here.
“We didn’t hit trouble until beyond the foothills. We’d actually reached the outskirts of ‘Anaskar’ and had our path chosen. Before we left, there was talk of paths in the Engineer’s texts. A hole in the wall, deep in the mountains, an old sea gate by the harbour or a bolt hole on the plain. Miles out, I’d felt the pattern of old feet, like a slight wave beneath my hand. We chose the plain. It was a long passage but we never saw its end. It might even be caved in, who knows?”
“What happened?” Ain asked. He leaned forward.
“Something found us. It stayed mostly beyond our torches, but it was fast enough to snatch my Engineer and begin its grisly work. He screamed for help but when the first spurt of blood hit me I fled. Dragged myself back here. There was no going home, not after what happened. What I did. All I can say is, I was young.”
“I’m sorry,” Ain said. Schan’s face was set in its usual mask of calm. “Is the bolt hole marked?”
Wilatt sighed through sudden tears. “You really want to die like that, lad, by whatever fell creature lives there?”
“No. But I must try, and I have no maps to those other places. The Cloud would not welcome me back if I gave up.”
“I know it.”
“Then you will help us?” Schan asked.
Wilatt was tapping both sets of fingers now. “A marsh, if that. Within a large swamp. It wasn’t much then, might not be there now. But the bolt hole was a day’s travel off the old road, near to two days out of the city – you will feel the path. Light, but there’s an urgency to the steps. Like people had used it to flee someone.” He met Ain’s eyes. “Or some thing.”
“You have our gratitude, Wilatt.”
He shrugged. “Watch for the path, hidden in the marshland. You’ll feel it. Watch also for the creatures which inhabit it. Their eyes, boy. Put out their eyes.”
“Ah, you’ve been very helpful, Wilatt. We will be careful.”
“I’d say fare you well, but I know better. There’s a reason why our people don’t return from the City of Secrets, those who make it that far.”
He moved toward the door, Schan following. “I have to prove everyone wrong.”
“I thought the same thing,” he called after them. Ain closed the door.
Chapter 25
The old road between the Wasteland and the green foothills beneath the City of Secrets was quiet. They passed no-one and the landscape remained featureless until the edge of the murky haze of swamplands appeared.
Now they crossed into the spongy ground of the swamp, both prodding the ground with long sticks. Sludge with tufts of grey and reeds grew around firmer ground, with short, twisted trees standing like green islands. Insects chirped in ceaseless song, almost hypnotic in its brittle pattern.
The path pulsed beneath Ain’s feet. There was a sense of urgency, but the trace of it didn’t always stay with firm ground. “This is taking longer than I’d hoped.” Ain wiped his brow beneath the afternoon sun. Three times now they’d detoured around wide pools of dark water, only to travel a dozen feet before having to do so again.
“Not a pleasant place to spend the night,” Schan agreed. The back of his shirt was wet with sweat and he growled. “And where did this damp heat come from?”
Ain drank from his flask. “Wilatt’s warning rings in my ear.”
“We’ve seen nothing yet.”
“True.” Small sounds sometimes came from water being stirred, in the larger pools, and did not instil confidence in him. But nothing leapt out, no creature attacked. The path grew stronger the deeper they travelled into the swamp.
Ain froze at movement. A lizard crossed the path, the pale creature slipping into the shrubs. His free hand was never far from his belt knife, but by the time they came upon a low mound overgrown with weeds, a pair of trees growing from its peak, he’d forgotten Wilatt’s talk of creatures whose eyes must be ‘put out.’
“Here.” The path led to an opening in the mound, its edges rife with yellowed tufts of grass. He bent down and tore a clump of weeds free. The dark maw beyond was just as Wilatt claimed. The bolt hole lay beside one of the widest ponds he’d seen in the swamp.
“We’ll have to dig some of the opening free.” Less than half the entrance was unobstructed, the build up of earth and weeds prevented easy access. The sun warmed his back.
Schan grinned. “You won first shift.”
“And how did I do that?”
“You’re just lucky.”
“My blessings are many,” he sighed, pulling his knife and digging in.
He stopped periodically to rake the loosened dirt with his arms, and by the time he and Schan had widened the opening enough, sweat cooled in the evening air. The sharp scent of turned earth filled his nose, pungent but somehow pleasant. In the desert nothing was comparable. Little white insects with dark heads curled in on themselves, shying from the light.
“Dark,” Schan said.
“Very.” While they had lamps in their packs, the oil was limited. How many miles from here, the bottom of the foothills, to the city? And what if the passage was collapsed, or worse, the creature still lurked within?
“Do you believe him? Wilatt?”
“No reason not to.”
Ain did not move. His knuckles were white on the handle, he unclenched them and took a shuddering breath. What lurked within? The path beneath his knees, resting on the damp soil, was... flickering. As if those who’d trodden it were being forgotten by the path. Had it been doing that earlier? Impossible to explain it any other way. Or guess what it might mean.
“Then we better keep our wits about us.”
Still he did not move.
Schan placed a hand on his shoulder. “If it’s our fate, lad, nothing we can do to change it.”
“I know. If the Sands will it.” Ain looked to the grey hills, a mist of distant rain shrouding them. “Aren’t you afraid?” Silaj. His child.
“Yes.” He stared into the maw. “I fear I will miss a chance for vengeance.”
“The War?”
He nodded. “Both my father and brother.”
“But you survived?”
“If you call it that.”
“What do you mean? You’re here, alive.”
“Sun-fever kept me abed. I never fought beside my family, as I should have. Instead, I will take my vengeance upon the Anaskari now, with you.”
“If the Sands will it, it will be,” Ain mouthed the words this time. When had their meaning changed? If the Sands willed anything, perhaps it was only death, one creeping grain at a time. For Ibranu, for Schan’s family, for his own family, for so many others. “I do not know what lies before us.”
“You will find a path. Come,” Schan said. “Help me with this lantern.”
Ain lit the lantern. He held it up and half-climbed, half-slid into the hole. The dark swept in around him despite his light and crawling things scuttled away as his boots crunched on loose dirt and stone.
“It’s paved.” He stooped over the floor. Regular paving stones, scattered with the soil he’d dislodged, revealed a familiar pattern. He recognised it from one of Ibranu’s scrolls. Known as a Sword-Fish, it looked like a thin animal with a pointed nose.
Anaskar.
“That’s a good sign,” Schan said. “And these are support beams.” He slapped a thick wooden beam, its surface glinting in the light. “Treated with something to keep the rot out.”
“It has done its job well then,” Ain said as he walked on. The way ahead was straight as an arrow.
The tunnel sloped down. Time passed in the sound of footfalls. Once they stopped to eat, crouched around the lamp, but there were no other markers. No sounds save for the many feet of an occasional insect. And the press of the earth above him, heavy like a blanket of black soil, suffocating.
Ain chanted the Prayer of Sand beneath his breath as he walked. “Sands willing, I will see another dawn. Sands willing, I will see another dawn.” The more he said it, the more desperate he sounded. His shoulders grew tense and he stopped several times to breathe, though it was difficult to take deep breaths. Everything was moist and chill. The very air tasted of dirt.
The open expanse of the desert called to him.
Even Schan wore a troubled expression and Ain clenched his jaw, fighting the urge to hack his way to the surface, or flee to the distant entrance and its pale light. Go on. Forward was the only way out. Turning back now meant a long, maybe fruitless search for other paths, or even a direct approach and certain death.
At least here, under the earth, he was concealed.
And the path still whispered beneath his tread, sometimes strong, sometimes faint, as if only a handful of people had ever used it. But when it was strong it beat against his soles and the thunder of flight, of panic was enough to stop him. He even took a step back, bumping into Schan. Did the bones of Wilatt’s Engineer lie beneath the earth?
“Ain?”
“It’s nothing. The path... I haven’t felt a path like this. Fear comes through the steps.” He closed his eyes. “They’re wide and hard. Running.”
“Recent?”
“They’re too muddled.”
Schan shrugged. “We keep walking then.”
“We do.”
The tunnel began to climb. It was not steep, but the rise was steady. By the time they’d stopped again for another meal, and to split the watch, the path was quiet again. He sighed, stretching his neck. Now that the panic was gone, a comparative calm settled over him.
“How much oil is –” Schan trailed off and moved to the edge of the light. “By the Sands.”
Ain placed his pack aside and joined the man. “Have you found something?”
“There.”
A wide recess had been dug between support beams, deep into the wall of earth. Cradled in the dirt were a pair of eggs. Each was larger than a human head, shells tinted gold. Small, rough mounds supported the shells and Ain shivered as he touched the damp walls of the tiny cave.
Claw marks. Gouges. Patches of coarse fur. Whatever made the opening was large. “We should leave them.”
“Whoever left these eggs is surely between us and the city.”
He froze, reply forgotten. A clicking drifted up the tunnel. Claws on stone. Coming closer, distant yet, but gaining in speed.
“Something comes.”
Chapter 26
Shivering and not quite clean, but not as filthy after cleaning himself in the aqueduct, Notch stood with Wayrn, Tenaci, Dilo and Kael. Wayrn wiped the clinging blue gunk from his clothing and Dilo’s small face now followed their every move, but Tenaci could not meet Notch’s gaze. Notch knew why but the time wasn’t right.
Kael’s eyes lit up when he first saw the head. It still dripped foul blue slime where it sat on display, axe haft protruding. A small crowd gathered. Many spoke in hushed voices and some of the children came forward to kick it, little fists at their sides and faces twisted. Most kept their distance.
“Thank you again, Notch and Wayrn,” he said. “You are mighty warriors both.”
“You’re very gracious, Kael. Can you help us now?”
“Of course.” To Dilo and Tenaci he said, “Go quickly, take others. Harvest what you can.”
“Harvest?” Wayrn asked when the two ran off. “Surely you don’t intend to eat such a thing?”
“Fallok, no.” Kael gave Wayrn a look, suggesting the man was insane. “We are taking the bones.”
“Oh. Why?”
“Do you know nothing of magic?” He pointed to the creature’s head. “We take fish bones to the Witch. That is how it works.”
No lands Notch had visited used fish bones for magic. Few seemed able to practice magic at all. Those in the Far Islands claimed they could read minds, but he’d never seen it. Luik had told stories around campfires about the depths of the Braonn forests, where certain butterflies could be caught and eaten, granting the diner magical powers. But those were children’s tales.
Even the Storm Singers were few in number, and whatever strange magic the Medah knew, he had not seen. He’d only witnessed their flashing sabres. Heard the snap of their bows. Seen the hate on the faces.
The small pouch of bones Tenaci carried, that day in the abandoned building, made sense after hearing Kael’s explanation. And why not? So much of the Anaskari way was the way of bones. The ornaments, furniture, the masks.
“You pay her with bones. Fish bones.”
“Yes. We take them from the dead fish in the harbour or the trash,” he said. “Or collect them from other places in the city. Metti takes them all. Big bones are best. Most powerful.” He rubbed his hands together. “With what you have done for us, we will not be hungry for many moons. The beast will have large bones.”
“Large indeed,” he said. “Kael, I would like to take a bone for Metti, as further payment.”
He waved a hand, an almost absent movement. His eyes were trained on the head. “Certainly. Tenaci will help you. He will guide you to Metti also.”
“And the ransom?”
Kael held out his hand. “We have no need of it now. No-one will speak to the Vigil about you. Either of you.”
“I’m not actually a wanted man, Kael,” Wayrn said.
“That is well.”
Notch grinned at Wayrn before taking Kael’s outstretched hand. “We appreciate your help.”
“Remember it, as we will remember what you have done for us.”
***
Notch stood across from a small seamstress, its door a fading green in the afternoon light. In a quiet back street where tiny garden plots of lemon trees nestled between houses, he’d removed his hood a moment, out of sight of the Mascare and Shield. His own posters remained on a few street corners, but he’d snatched a fresh poster from an inn on the way to the seamstress.
Sofia.
In the poster, Prince Oson named her, both by title and House. The image was a close likeness, no one would mistake her fine bones and determined gaze if they saw her in person. The desperate need was clear. Oson wanted her, willing to completely destroy her chances of keeping her identity secret. She could never hide herself within the palace, within the First Tier, as all knew that the Successor was a young woman. That Sofia was no doubt used to.
But to unmask her to the people.
He would find her. Together they would bring the Swordfish down.
He exhaled, gaze drawn back to the green door. Notch shook his head. “I can’t believe the Harbour Witch has been in the Second Tier all this time. A simple ploy. But clever.”
“Hmmm.” Tenaci said. Throughout their trip back to the surface, and along the streets, the boy said little. It was clear he wasn’t going to mention the creature, Notch would have to do so. And before Wayrn returned with food.
“Tenaci, don’t be hard on yourself.”
His head snapped up from where he’d been examining the street, eyes wary. He’d made a fist by his side but didn’t appear to notice. “What do you mean?”
“With the beast. That you didn’t join it in battle, directly.” The boy began to bluster but Notch held up a hand. “I’m trying to tell you I’m not going to judge you. A first battle is hard. Terrifying.”
Tenaci’s shoulders slumped. “It took my sister. I should’ve been able to fight. I wanted to. But I couldn’t make my legs move. Even when Dilo attacked.” He looked to the ground. “I’m a coward.”
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