Ian Irvine - Alchymist

You never were a fraud to me, Irisis.'

'But I was in my own eyes.' After a moment's reflection she said, 'So how are you? You've changed. Nish. You're not the man who left us, last winter.'

'The boy', he said scornfully. 'I was no man. Yes, I have changed. I've seen enough adventure for a dozen lifetimes.'

'It's done you good.' She looked him up and down. 'You're a handsome man now. I like your beard.'

'It's better than scraping the skin off my face every morning.' He eyed her. 'I do believe you look more magnificent than ever. You seem to have bloomed.'

'I had a new lover for a while, Nish, no less than the scrutator himself, though it's over now.' She hadn't told Flydd yet. She hoped he'd take it well.

'I thought there was something between you, back when Flydd came to negotiate with Vithis. What else have you been up to?'

'Oh, I've had a few adventures too. A couple of run-ins with your father. A spell down in the tar pits of Snizort. You know the sort of thing.'

He leaned on the wall, companionably. 'It's a wonder we didn't run into each other. Why don't you tell me about it?'

'I'd rather hear your story, Nish, if you don't mind.'

He was happy to relate it, sitting on the port side, towards the stern, out of the wind, with Irisis facing him. She listened in silence until he mentioned Ullii being pregnant with his child.

'You didn't know!' she said incredulously.

'No one told me, and she was wearing a smock like a tent. How was I to tell? Nonetheless, I let her down, and now I'm paying for it.'

He went on with his story: the attack in the clearing, how his folly had brought down the air-floater, the ghastly death of Mylii, Ullii fleeing and not being seen again, and all the anguish that had caused him.

She knew he was telling the whole truth. Irisis took his hand, glad she'd held off from saying how she really felt — he was in no state to hear it. Her suit was going to be longer than she'd expected, and she'd have to be more careful. Not Ullii! she thought. No woman could be more wrong for him. Surely it could never come to pass?

She bit down on the jealousy. 'How you must have suffered.'

'It cost me dear — not least the child I'll never know. That's the hardest thing of all.'

'There's been no word of Ullii?'

'It's as if she vanished off the face of Lauralin. And she hates me, Irisis, though it was just a terrible accident. It was dark; I thought he was attacking her. He just reared back onto the knife and it went right into him.' He choked.

She drew him to her, folding her long arms around his compact, muscled body. 'You don't have to justify yourself to me,' she said softly.

'But I do have to live with it. Ah, Irisis, how I've missed you.'

'Do you want to tell me the rest of the story?'

'Maybe later. Where are we, anyway?'

'Heading up the western side of Meldorin Island.'

'Meldorin!' he cried, looking over the side as if to see lyrinx everywhere. 'Where are we going?'

'No idea. Bloody Flydd is acting all mysterious, as usual.'

The sun went down into the ocean to their left, and the evening light faded swiftly, though before it grew completely dark they beheld the walls of a great fortress in the distance. Black it was, even blacker than the shadowy forest that surrounded it, a forbidding wall of stone encircling a yard, and an inner fortress with horned towers.

'Is that our destination?' Nish asked Flydd, who was walking by.

'It is.' Flydd cast him an unreadable glance. 'Dragged yourself out of bed at last, I see.'

Nish didn't rise to the bait. He was used to Flydd's ways by now, and the tone had been almost affectionate. 'It's not a lyrinx fortress?'

'It belongs to an older power.' Flydd continued down to Inouye. 'Go over the outer wall, Inouye, and come down in the yard by the horned tower. See it there?'

'I see it.' Her voice was like a single page falling to the ground.

The air-floater passed over the wall. No guards could be seen, so Inouye settled the machine in the bleak yard. It came to rest without a bump. The rotor slowly spun down, the floater-gas generator fell silent.

Again that shiver up Irisis's spine.

'I don't like this place. Where are we?'

'We're in the one place in Meldorin that the scrutators will never find us. Not even the lyrinx dare come here. This is the ancient Aachim fortress of Fiz Gorge.’

Somewhere within the fortress an alarm clanged, like a broken bell.

'Fiz Gorgo!' cried Nish. 'Wasn't that the fortress of the great mancer Yggur, back in the time of the Tale of the Mirror?'

'It was,' said Flydd, and Irisis could hear him cracking his knuckles anxiously.

'Who controls it now?'

'We're about to find out. Climb up on top of the cabin, Nish, and tear open that patch on the airbag.'

'What?' he cried.

'Just do it, and be quick; Flydd hissed, 'or the enemy will breakfast on your kidneys.'

Irisis wondered if the scrutator had gone mad. So, evidently, did Nish, but he did what he was told, then sprang down again. Floater gas sighed from the gash and slowly the balloon sagged until, in a few minutes, the structure of its wire ribs could be seen. Gravel crunched under the keel as the cabin tilted onto its side.

Nish began to climb over the rail. 'Stay where you are,' Flydd said quietly.

They waited. All was silent. No bird sang, no cricket chirped. Not a single leaf rustled.

Irisis's nape prickled. 'Someone's watching us,' she said under her breath, without knowing how she knew it.

'Be quiet.'

Her eyes were drawn up the tower, all the way to the horns on each extremity. No, not there. She followed the rough stone down to a point a little more than halfway from the ground. A balcony projected straight out, a shaped slab of stone without roof or rail. Someone stood there, or something, but she could not see what it was.

A lamp or glowing globe on the wall came on, outlining the figure from behind. It was very tall, and man-shaped, but concealed by a greatcoat that swept to the floor. The figure stepped to the edge.

'Begone, whoever you are, back to where you came from. Visitors are not welcome here.' It was human, a man with a mellow, carrying voice that bore more than an underlying hint of steel. This man was master and no argument, Irisis sensed, would sway him.

'I am Xervish Flydd, surr,' the scrutator called up, respectfully. 'Scrutator for Einunar —’

'Then you've a long journey home, Scrutator Flydd. Begin it at once. You are not welcome in Fiz Gorgo.'

'I would, surr, but as you can see, our air-floater floats no more and cannot be repaired today. I beg your indulgence until the morning.'

The man shifted his weight. 'I am bereft of indulgence and every other form of human weakness,' he said coldly. 'Take your abominable machine and begone!'

'It can't be moved, surr, within twenty-four hours. We'll go if we must, but the machine must stay where it lies. If you would care to inspect it…'

The figure whirled, the light went out and a door slammed.

'Don't say a word, unless he speaks directly to you,' Flydd said over his shoulder. 'If he does, confine your answers to yes or no. Venture no explanations.'

Before them, up a few steps from the base of the tower, stood a set of doors so vast that the cabin of the air-floater could have fitted between. The doors opened silently and a blinding light shone through them, revealing that the yard was paved in black stone. There was no living thing in sight. Not a single weed grew inside the walls.

The man appeared, greatcoat flapping. Illuminated from behind, he looked twice the size of any normal man. He strode through the door and came down the broad steps to the air-floater.

'Get out!'