Robert Redick - The Night of the Swarm

‘ Stop! ’

It was Dri’s voice. She could see them. Desperately she waved for Ensyl to be still. Then her eyes moved back to Hercol. ‘Arunis. . being helped. . the demon-mage. . Sathek.’

‘Sathek!’ cried Neda and Cayer Vispek.

Dri’s face was almost mad with pain. She looked again at Ensyl and switched tongues, falling into the speech of ixchel, beyond the range of human ears. Ensyl nodded, weeping uncontrollably. Then Diadrelu placed a hand flat on either side of Ildraquin and swept them all with her eyes.

‘No quitting,’ she said, and pushed herself free.

The tiny body fell to earth. Hercol lunged, but Ramachni was faster. Pouncing on Diadrelu, he sank his fangs into her side, and with a sharp twist of his body, flung her into the fire. Hercol did not make a sound, but he shuddered, as from a death blow. Yet even as Diadrelu struck the flames, she vanished. In her place the sorcerer’s head reappeared, mouthing a last, voiceless curse.

Hercol walked out among the reeds by the river’s edge, with Ensyl on his shoulder. They sat there, half-hidden, and their sounds of grief floated softly over the clearing. Thasha pulled Pazel and Neeps into her arms and wept. The tarboys stood numb, holding her between them. Pazel could not say exactly where his own tears had gone. He only knew, as he had that morning in the river, that he couldn’t afford them. Your labour’s not done . Manifestly mucking true. Friends had died, he was still standing. Bring on the next thing, the next kick in the gut.

‘It was her,’ Thasha kept repeating. ‘It was really her.’

‘Yes,’ said Ramachni. ‘Arunis was using her, of course. But being fearless, she sought to turn his torture to our advantage. Even in death she has not given up the fight.’

Neda and Cayer Vispek stood gaping. Corporal Mandric shook his head in disbelief. Humans no more cried for ixchel than a dog did for its fleas.

As for Myett, she raced away from them all up the broken stairs. Eyes dry, thoughts black. She could not bear to think of them looking at her. With compassion, maybe, with forgiveness. She had watched Hercol broken once already, at the moment of Diadrelu’s death — her real death on the Chathrand , which Myett had helped bring about. She had taunted him, called him goat, satyr, sexual freak. All for Taliktrum. All to justify the extremes he was going to, the messianic make-believe, the killing of his rivals, the killing of his aunt.

Didn’t you know? The question chased her, nipped her heels. Didn’t you know it was false, the way Taliktrum excused his own brutality (I am your deliverer, the one to whom vision is given; I am my own reason why)? Couldn’t you see it in his violence, his fear? After each encounter with Diadrelu he would rage at Myett, or strip and straddle her like a rapist, or worst of all sit quivering alone. Didn’t you know it was a lie? Of course, of course. But she had managed not to know. She kept the knowledge hidden, a black stone in her stomach, until the day that Taliktrum himself could bear the lie no more.

She understood at last why he had cast her off. Taliktrum had shed family blood. And every glimpse of Myett had reminded him of the deed. It could never be otherwise. Even if he lived, and she found him, somewhere in this vast, vicious world — even then, it would lie between them. She climbed on, heedless of the growing wind, the slickness of the weathered stones.

Pazel sat staring into the fire. He could smell Arunis burning. It sickened him, and yet he craved the smell. There could never be enough proof that the mage was gone. Hercol and Ensyl were still crouched by the river. Neeps was walking up and down with Thasha, who was too distraught to hold still. Dastu sat a few yards from Pazel, likewise studying the fire.

‘Muketch,’ he said, ‘I’ve been meaning to thank you.’

Pazel turned to him, benumbed. ‘To thank me?’

‘For what you did on the tower. You saved us, every bit as much as Thasha did.’

Pazel swallowed. ‘I killed a man in the process.’

Dastu shook his head. ‘Not a man.’

Pazel sighed and nodded. True enough: the tol-chenni had never had a human mind. It had been born with animal intelligence, and its parents had been the same. But its grandparents, or great-grandparents: who had they been? Shopkeepers in Masalym? Teachers, maybe? Newlyweds, with dreams for their children?

Some questions (many questions) were better left unasked.

‘You’ve learned some fighting skills,’ said Dastu.

Pazel shook his head. ‘Only a little, from Thasha and Hercol. I’ll never be really good.’

Pazel recalled a time when the compliment would have felt like a gift. He had once thought of Dastu as his best friend among the tarboys, after Neeps. He had delighted, secretly, in the fact that Dastu was pure Arquali, and yet free of the contempt for conquered races that infected so many. He’d adored the older boy. Everyone had: even those who never looked at Pazel or Neeps without a sneer.

Then Dastu had turned them in for mutiny.

Of course they were mutineers, Pazel and his friends. They’d met in a lightless room in the bowels of the Chathrand , to plan their takeover. Their true enemy was Arunis, but there had been no way to fight him without defying Captain Rose.

Pazel looked pointedly at Dastu. ‘You still think we should be hanged?’ he asked.

Dastu looked away. ‘I’m loyal to Arqual. I swore an oath to my Emperor, and to the Service.’

‘That’s a yes, is it?’

The older youth shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter what I think. Not to anyone. Pitfire, it hardly matters to me . Listen, Muketch: we have to toss the Nilstone in the river. Not on Gurishal. Right here. I know what Ramachni says about poisoning a well. But we have no choice, no other chance. And think of it this way.’

He scooped up two handfuls of dirt. ‘Suppose we set off for Gurishal — somehow.’ He let one handful sift through his fingers. ‘The Stone remains in Alifros. The Swarm grows, the world is destroyed. That will happen. We’ll struggle on awhile, then we’ll fail, and everything will go to pieces. Look around and tell me I’m wrong. Look at us, Muketch; look at your leg. Think of where we are.’

‘Denial is death,’ murmured Pazel.

The other boy looked up sharply. ‘Rin’s truth, that is.’ He opened his other hand, gazed at the sandy earth. ‘But in another world, who can say? Maybe they’re stronger, maybe they have great lords or wizards who’ll know what to do with the Nilstone. All we know is what happens if it stays here.’

‘That’s all we know,’ Pazel agreed.

Encouraged, Dastu leaned closer, lowering his voice. ‘Bolutu’s dead set against it, just like the mage. But there’s one good thing about being here, in this Godsforsaken wilderness. You know what I mean. We outnumber them. We humans outnumber the dlomu, and if we know what’s good for us we’ll stick together. Do you understand me, Muketch?’

Pazel looked at him a moment. ‘Yes, I think I do. And just now I was thinking of what you said that day, when I asked why you’d betrayed us. You told me to save my breath. That nothing I could say would make a difference to you, because you had your loyalties straight. Well, so do I, and they begin with Ramachni. Without him Arunis would have beaten us a long time ago.’

‘Arunis nearly killed us last night. Because of Ramachni.’

Pazel shook his head. ‘In spite of him. I won’t help you, Dastu. And you’re not getting near that mucking Stone by yourself. We’ll carry it to Gurishal, somehow. And you know what else? You’re here for a reason. Doesn’t Ott always boast about leaving nothing to chance? He sent you along to help us on this mission, not to hinder us. Are you going to obey him or not?’