Vengeance

CHAPTER 54

Parby’s commanding voice echoed up the slope. ‘Lord Rixium?’

‘Go!’ hissed Tobry. ‘They mustn’t see her.’

‘Why not?’ said Tali. ‘What’s going on?’

Rix stood up. ‘Seneschal Parby! Thank you — ’

‘Lady Ricinus sends her compliments,’ boomed Parby, ‘and bids you to return home immediately.’

Rix bowed from the waist. ‘And I come running, like a cringing lapdog,’ he said in an aside. ‘Tobe, think of something — ’

Tali could scarcely credit the change in Rix. He looked like a naughty boy who had been caught out and was about to be punished.

‘I’ll fix it,’ sighed Tobry. ‘Get me a horse — ’

‘What about Rannilt?’ said Tali.

He took her hand. ‘Do you think I’d forget her? Rix, tell Parby I’ve got urgent business elsewhere. We’re going back.’

‘That’s bloody dangerous — but of course …’

‘I know,’ said Tobry.

Rix clasped his arm. ‘You can’t go unarmed.’

‘I’ll collect a blade from the dead. There are plenty to choose from.’

‘No.’ Impulsively, Rix unbuckled his sheath and held it out. ‘Take mine.’

‘You sure?’

‘Its enchantment saved us the other day.’

‘Thanks,’ said Tobry, buckling it on. ‘It might help with Rannilt’s shadow and shape, too.’

‘Lord Rixium?’ the seneschal called, curtly.

‘I’m coming!’ Rix turned down the slope, turned back. ‘Where will you take her, Tobe?’

‘To Abbess Hildy.’

‘Hildy doesn’t love House Ricinus.’

‘She’s not fond of me, either, but she’s the best healer I know.’

‘I know how to soothe her ruffled feelings.’ Rix handed him a small leather bag.

Tobry pocketed it. ‘Tali, if I come up straight away, Parby will be suspicious. I’ll ride a little way with Rix and double back.’

Don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me here all alone.

She lay in the shadow of the boulder, listening as they scrambled down to the plain and rode away. Time drifted in a haze of pain, her helplessness magnifying every fear tenfold. What if he didn’t come back? The bodies would attract predators from all directions and they would soon sniff her out. What if Tobry encountered more Cythonians? Or they came up to investigate?

A horse approached; footsteps crunched up the slope.

‘Tobry?’ she croaked.

‘It’s me, Tali. It’s just me.’

Then he was beside her, lifting her in his arms, and she clung to him like a lost lover, all reserve gone. She closed her eyes. She was safe; she could leave it to him now …

The next hour was torn into fragments: being lugged, Tobry slipping and sliding, down the slope; hanging head-down across a saddle, every bump and jounce sending pulses of agony through her thigh; Tobry helping her drink from his cupped hand, the water having a mouth-puckering bitterness that left a residue on her teeth; night falling and him riding on, now holding her against his chest; the elbrot flaring. He seemed to be finding his way with a magery that sensed the firmness of the ground ahead, or perhaps the heat of it. Then, finally, sleep. Blessed oblivion.

The call, more urgent and strident than ever, shocked her awake. She snapped the shell closed, trembling. It was still dark, the endless hunt still went on and her hunter was closer than before. Much closer.

‘Tobry,’ she whispered, ‘I’m afraid.’

‘It’s all right,’ he said softly.

‘He’s out there, tracking me.’

‘There’s no one behind us.’

‘You don’t understand.’ She twisted around in the saddle. ‘Mama said he’s never seen, never heard, but he flutters in my nightmares like a foul wrythen.’

Tobry stiffened and reined in. ‘What did you say?’

‘The people who killed my mother aren’t my worst enemies, and neither is Tinyhead. My real enemy is his master — ’

‘You told me that before. Why did you call him a wrythen?’

‘My mother said it, though I never thought she meant a real wrythen.’

Tobry’s eyes were darting. ‘Tell me about him.’

‘Since the night I came of age, I’ve been hearing an angry little note in my head. I think of it as the call because it feels like one, and I’m sure he’s tracking me by it. Sometimes I hear a higher, distant note that feels like a reply.’ She explained about closing the call off with her mental shell.

Tobry said nothing, though she could tell that he was disturbed.

‘Why does a wrythen bother you so much?’ said Tali.

‘We were nearly killed by one in the mountains a few days ago.’ He briefly related their encounter with the caitsthe and the wrythen, and what they had seen in the lower caverns. ‘Had it not been for Rix, I’d be dead by now. Or possessed by the foul creature — worse than death.’

The cold night grew colder. The conspiracy was greater than she had thought, the danger more deadly. Was that why Rix had been watching Tobry earlier? Was Rix afraid the wrythen had possessed his friend? And had it? Was it looking out of Tobry’s eyes whenever she turned her back? She did not think so — when the wrythen had taken over Tinyhead his eyes had been yellow and almost no trace of Tinyhead had remained. Unless the wrythen could conceal his eyes when he wanted to …

‘I’ve been told my enemy can only be beaten by magery,’ said Tali, ‘but I can’t find mine.’ She told him about her reluctant gift, which both her mother and Mimoy had said was different.

‘It was certainly different when I killed Banj,’ she concluded, shivering at the memories. ‘But I had no more control than before.’

‘So the bursting sunstone roused your magery,’ said Tobry. ‘And woke Rannilt’s hidden gift. Curious.’

She looked up at his craggy face and realised, for the first time, that he liked her. She hesitated — it was hard for her to ask anyone for help, but she had to.

‘Tobry, you know magery. Can you help me?’

‘Me?’ He laughed uneasily. ‘Don’t be silly.’

Heat rose to her face. What was the matter? Didn’t he trust her with it? Or did he think of her as a child? Tali felt herself shrinking, but she had to convince him. There was no one else. ‘Why not?’

‘It’s not a good idea,’ he said evasively.

‘Why not?’

‘I’m … not my own man.’

What was that supposed to mean? Or was it an excuse? ‘Tobry, he’s after me. I just heard the call again. That’s what woke me — ’

‘Even more reason,’ Tobry said.

She clutched at his wrist, not realising that she was shaking it. ‘Please, I’m desperate and you’re all I’ve got.’

He closed his eyes, turned away, turned back. ‘I can’t, Tali. Please don’t ask me again.’

It was worse than a slap in the face. It felt like a repudiation of their friendship. She turned away, alone again.

‘There are ways to uncover hidden or buried gifts,’ said Tobry. ‘Once we reach Caulderon I’ll consult a friend who’s far more skilled in magery than I am.’

She swung around. The offer was worse than nothing. ‘You can’t tell anyone about it!’ she cried.

‘All right, all right.’ He thought for a minute. ‘There was a device for this purpose, a very ancient thing …’

‘A device?’ she said grudgingly.

‘It came from Thanneron with the Fleeters. What was it called? A pry-probe? Spectible?’

He shook the reins and the horse took off, sending a shuddery pulse of pain through her and robbing her of the strength to question him further.

She drifted …

‘No,’ groaned Tobry. ‘Get out, out, out!’

Tali roused from tormented dreams with the call reverberating in her head like a pealing bell. She forced the shell to close around it and managed to choke it down to a whisper, though for the first time she could not close it off completely, and surely that meant …

Tobry moaned, a piteous sound.

She felt about in the dark. His left arm was thrashing up and down. She caught it and held him. ‘Tobry, what is it?’

‘Urggh! Unrggh-rrggh, rggh!’ He slumped onto her, squashing her down until her head hit the saddle horn.

She pushed herself upright. He was hotter than Rix had been when she’d laid her healing hands on him by the lake, and from such an awkward position she could not help Tobry.

If she dragged him to the ground, she would never get him back into the saddle. Tali heaved herself around until she was facing him, ignoring the spears of pain, and took his face between her hands. She was attempting to work the healing charm when her mind-shell was wrenched wide and the call went off like a shriek. No, like a beacon calling her enemy to her.

She tried to close the shell but something was forcing it wide open from the other side. Something far stronger than her was trying to snap it at the hinges so it could never be closed. She could barely hold it, and Tobry was growing ever hotter under her hands. If she could not summon her healing gift he would die, consumed from the inside. Yet if she did use it on him, she would not have the strength to hold the shell at all, and that would be very bad …

Mine, came a whisper, and she sensed shadows groping in a deeper darkness, familiar shadows, searching for her. You’re mine and you will bring her to …

Tobry shuddered; panted; groaned, ‘No!’

It was as though two people were fighting over her. She felt resistance, then the voice continued, I left my mark in you. You can’t keep me out. Bring her!

‘I won’t,’ she ground out, and lurched backwards in the saddle. ‘Get out of my head!’

Shock! Alarm, then the sounds retreated until they were a meaningless buzz — coming from Tobry’s head!

The voice had not been speaking to her. It had been giving orders to Tobry, orders about her. To bring her where? To the murder cellar?

The familiarity crystallised. Rix had been right to be worried — the wrythen had left something in Tobry when it attacked him in the caverns. Now it was trying to take control of him and make him do the job Tinyhead had failed at. The wrythen and her enemy were the same, and if he took command of Tobry, she was lost. Tobry must have been expecting it — that’s why he had refused to help with her magery.

Tali could not see how to block a presence that was within Tobry, not herself. Wait! The wrythen was tracking her via the call, and only after he forced open the shell had he broken through to Tobry. The call had to be blocked before she tried to help Tobry — if she still had the strength to block it.

Tali squeezed her palms around her own head, one hand pressing against her forehead and the other on the back of her skull, as if by doing so she could prevent her enemy from doing to her what he had done to Tinyhead. She squeezed so hard that her thigh wound began to pulse. She had to ignore it; had to turn her enemy aside and block the call before it betrayed her.

Harder she squeezed, and harder, conjuring up the image of the protective shell and forcing it closed with all her driving will.

‘Stop!’ Tobry cried, swaying wildly and almost falling out of the saddle. ‘It’s burning, burning. Tali, help!’

One flailing hand struck her on the cheek, hard enough to bring tears to her eyes. She lost concentration for a second, the shell was forced wide and she heard another voice …

The thing in the dark. Shadow and shape, shiftin’, always shiftin’.

A huge, loping creature stopped, stood up on back legs until it would have towered over Rix, and turned in her direction, sniffing the air. Sickle-shaped pupils contracted to points; claws clotted with rancid fat and day-old blood extended; shadows fluttered around it, expanding and contracting. She caught a whiff, or imagined she did, of hot breath tainted with offal and carrion, then the maw opened wide, emitting not the roar she would have expected, but a repeated pinging sound, a false note like some corrupt mimicry of the note that was a distant reply to her call.

Pinnnng, pinnnng, pinnnng.

That’s it, said the wrythen. Fix on her. Steady, steady. Take her and you can drink the foul magian’s blood. But do not harm her.

Tobry’s moan, deep in his throat, made her hair stand on end. His cheeks were glowing red in the dark, his eyes taking on the same gleam as Tinyhead’s had before his head had been burnt through, now showing a trace of yellow.

Pinnnng, pinnnng, pinnnng.

The sounds rose and fell as though a beam was sweeping across her and back, and sick terror overwhelmed her. She wanted to fling herself off the horse and run, anywhere. Tali struggled to fight it. She could not run. She would be lucky to stand up. And without her, Tobry was going to die. Clamping her hands harder around her skull, she squeezed with all the strength remaining to her.

Pinnnng, pinnnng, pinnnng.

‘Close, close!’ she gasped, forcing physically and mentally at the same time.

With an audible snap, the shell slammed, and both the call, the pinging and the presence in Tobry’s head cut off. So did the sense of that loping creature but she knew it was still out there, searching.

With a little sigh, Tobry toppled sideways out of the saddle. Tali almost followed him, for she was shaking so badly that she could not hang on. Twisting her hands through the stirrup straps, she half fell, half slid down, hit the ground and her bad leg crumpled under her.

Her head was ringing, her hands trembling so violently that she could not hold them against him. She crouched over Tobry and pressed her forehead to his.

‘Heal, heal!’

Normally she could feel the healing force leaving her as she worked, but Tali was so drained that she felt nothing now. She lay beside him, her cold cheek touching his feverish one. From way out in the Seethings echoed an eerie shriek, so uncanny that she could not imagine any normal beast making it.

‘Heal,’ she whispered. ‘Please heal, Tobry, or we’re both dead.’