Hugh Cook - The wizards and the warriors

'Mister,' said Blackwood. 'We have to bury our dead. Otherwise they end up living our lives for us.'

'And you're the one who was sorry for the dead Melski!'

'Mister, we mourn to free us for the future. From the sound of it, you're still trapped in the past. Is it the past, perhaps, which makes you drive so hard after wizards?'

Blackwood was only talking, in the most general terms, of the fanaticism which Alish had demonstrated in his pursuit of Heenmor, but Alish was provoked into saying: 'That's nothing to do with the past. Wizards are the final enemy. All of them!'

There. He had said it. He had touched on the hidden matters: the secrets of the Code of Night. But he needed to talk, yes, more than ever before he needed to talk.

'Wizards defeated the Swarms,' ventured Blackwood, who knew that much at least from legend.

Alish laughed.

'I've heard those stories, the same as you have,' said Alish. 'Who do you think makes them up?'

'Wizards, perhaps. They should know their own business, after all.'

'We have records on Rovac going back to the Long War – records which prove that history… history didn't quite happen the way it's told.'

'You have long memories, mister.'

'Yes,' said Alish. 'Remember Rovac has never tried to conquer, only to serve as mercenaries. That's why we've 'scaped the cycle of rise, decline and fall that empires suffer. Our archives are intact. So let me tell you a little of the history of this continent, Argan.

'There was a time when the Swarms lived much, much further south than they do now. Way back then, the people who called themselves the Dareska Amath lived in the lands bordering the Ocean of Cambria. They were warlike, always engaged in blood feuds and clan fights.

'Then the wizards, who wanted to rule the known world, decided to capture an entity known as the Skull of the Deep South. The Skull commands the Swarms. Controlling that power, the wizards could have conquered the world.

'They persuaded the Dareska Amath to help them, and the Dareska Amath agreed. Armies marched south in support of the wizards. They suffered great losses at the hands of fearful enemies, but they persevered, for there were heroes among them. In the end, though, in a crucial battle against the Swarms, the wizards broke and ran. It was an act of cowardice which led to a terrible defeat and the end of the expedition.

'Now the wizards knew the Swarms would begin to move north. They had committed a crime against humanity by stirring up the wrath of the Skull of the Deep South: so they decided to kill all witnesses. They laid waste to the lands around the Ocean of Cambria.

'That was the time of selection. Only the best fighters and seafarers survived the destruction of our homelands. Exiled from Argan, they sailed west till they came to the islands of Rovac. Our destiny is to destroy the wizards and recapture the lands around the Ocean of Cambria.'

'I have never heard that story before,' said Blackwood.

'It is not a story lightly shared,' said Alish.

'I understand,' said Blackwood.

And Alish lay back on the raft, shut his eyes, and was quiet, as if sleeping.

Another short summer night passed, uneasily, but without incident, and morning found the rafts still drifting down the river. That morning, Comedo emerged from his bottle and blinked at the river, the rafts, and, not the least of his amazements, the sunlight.

'What are we doing here?' he said.

Nobody paid him any attention. The least of those fighting men now felt himself to be a questing hero; their respect for the Favoured Blood had declined with their shared experiences of marching and battle which had occured in the absence of that Blood.

'What are we doing here?' yelled Comedo.

'Look!' cried an anonymous wit, safe in the company of his fellows, it's the rare and famous hairy woubit!'

There was a light splatter of laughter.

Comedo stalked over to Hearst, who was trailing a fishing line off the end of a raft..'Where are we? What are we doing here?'

'We're going down the Fleuve River on some Melski rafts,' said Hearst. 'Soon we'll reach Ep Pass. Then we'll head east across the Spine Mountains, making for Stronghold Handfast.'

'Valarkin said as much,' said Comedo, looking pale and agitated. 'But it can't be true! I said to go home! Days ago! I've had enough, do you hear me? I want to go back.'

'My lord,' said Hearst. 'You're surely comfortable enough in your miraculous green bottle.'

'Didn't you hear me? I want to go back.'

'You pledged yourself to pursue Heenmor to the uttermost limit and to do all in your power to destroy him,' said Hearst. 'We're to kill Heenmor and give his magic death-stone to the wizards for them to take south and return to the Dry Pit.' i withdraw my pledge,' said Comedo.

Hearst spat.

'A man's word is not like a snake that comes out of a hole to look at the sun. It can't run back inside.'

Comedo started to scream. Some men looked up, slow and lazy as Hearst was, and studied his face. Comedo screamed himself hoarse. It did him no good. i want to go home,' said Comedo.

Hearst laughed in his face.

Comedo's face twisted in anger. His mouth clutched breath, then he began to scream again. Screaming, he spun round and round, then suddenly twisted the ring on his finger and dissolved into smoke which was sucked back into the bottle.

The rafts drifted on down the river.

They enjoyed hot, lazy, sunlit weather in which a single day seemed to stretch half-way to eternity. Drifting downriver in that golden weather, the men sunbathed, gambled, tattooed each other, swam in the riverdrift, told jokes and obscene stories, exchanged confidences, caught fish and invented new ways of cooking it: with cloves and a pinch of siege dust; smoked slowly over burning pine resin; guts and flesh mixed together in a clay ball with a little barley flour, and baked. Some men, like Durnwold and Alish, practised weapon skills. Elkor Alish put on spectacular displays of shadow-fighting as he accustomed himself to the balance of an antique Melski blade which he had taken for his own use.

And Comedo did not return.

Alish lay half-asleep in the sun, dreaming vaguely about conquering Argan with the death-stone. Should he take Prince Comedo on his campaigns? There might be rulers in Argan who would find it easier to bow to a prince of the Favoured Blood than to a Rovac mercenary. He would think about it… 'Elkor Alish.'

He opened his eyes, and saw the woodsman Blackwood. 'What is it?'

'We're almost there. We're almost at Ep Pass.'

'Good," said Alish, getting to his feet.

Throughout the flotilla, men began to rouse themselves. They heaved on sweep-oars, guiding the rafts toward a stony beach on the eastern side of the river. Beyond the beach was a gap in the cliffs about two hundred paces wide: the beginning of Ep Pass, the way through the Spine Mountains.

Downstream, the river narrowed, running swiftly between towering cliffs; perched on rocks by the racing river were a few dozen Melski, some with small fires burning. Some of the men tried the range with arrows.

'That's enough of that!' said Alish.

There was no point in going to war with the Melski, who had passed up every chance of ambush and seemed to be planning no more than the recovery of some of their rafts. It would be a long, slow journey for them to oar their way upstream, but for the task they had greater strength in their chests and arms than most humans.

On landing, Alish had the rafts dragged ashore. 217 Despite the proximity of the Melski, he did not want to march east immediately, thinking it best to scout ahead a little first, to get an idea of what the country was like. He chose Hearst and Durnwold to go with him.