Southern Fire

Chapter Nine

'If you're going to take your omens at dawn, you have to decide when that is. Some say it's when you can first tell a black thread from a white laid across your palm. Others say it's not till the sun is fully clear of the horizon. That's a goodly difference in time, when it comes to reading portents, my lad. I take it as the moment when the light of the coming day turns from grey to yellow.'

I never shared your confidence in judging such a subtle shift, my father, so decided to making sure I always have a view of the sea when taking such omens and watching for the first brilliant edge of the rising sun. Which does me little good, when all I can see is trees and bushes. Still, unless someone turns up with a handful of black and white threads to say otherwise, it must surely still be before dawn.

Kheda paused to catch his breath in the dim half-light that was just beginning to outline the crudely plundered scrub that bordered the Ulla islanders' vegetable plots and stands of carefully tended fruit trees. He looked up but there were no more shooting stars to be seen. Rubbing a hand over eyes sore with weariness and whatever filth had been in the river, he pushed on through the brittle vegetation. Everything was parched and desperate for the rains, even in this well-watered island of mountains and rivers. Moving off once more, his feet found a bare line of earth marked with the dainty slots that betokened forest deer, overlaid at one point by the thicker, deeper prints of a foraging hog. A game trail.

Follow it for a little while, for the sake of moving fast and quiet, just as long as you're off it before any trappers come up from the farmland looking for forest meat. Remember to look for their snares while you're at it. You still can't risk discovery.

As he ran, he kept a wary eye on the strengthening light above the treetops as well as staying alert for any sound of voices or dogs. He had come far enough to be confident no search sent out from the fortress would find him, but encountering some hunting party returning from a night expedition would be just as bad. Apprehension lent new vigour to limbs aching from ceaseless effort. When the light brought a measure of true colour back to the scrub around him, Kheda reluctantly abandoned the track, climbing a little higher up the side of the broad valley for the thicker cover offered by the margins of the true forest. The denser growth forced him to slow but walking rather than running didn't come as much of a relief. The temptation to stop altogether grew stronger and more insidious.

Just a few moments wouldn't make any difference, not just a little rest to rub your exhausted muscles. Shouldn't you be stopping to look for a stream? You're so very thirsty. No? No. Don't be such a fool. Keep going and think about something else.

The smell of smoke distracted him from the wearisome repetition of such thoughts. After the first rush of alarm froze him among the dusty saplings like a startled deer, Kheda realised the pungent scent was no more than a taste on the breeze, carried up from the distant huts among the sailer plots that lay beyond the scrubby brush and the haphazard band of cultivation. Pounding heart slowing, Kheda moved on, smoke-prompted memory uncoiling before him.

'Of course this is a hunting trip. We'll be calling for men from the villages to carry the meat down for smoking on the shore every second day.' Daish Reik had smiled down, green eyes bright, black beard curling exuberantly now it was freed from the dictates of oil and comb. 'We'll eat well right through the dry season, us and all the islanders who lend a hand.'

'But that's not all this trip is.' Kheda could see several of his brothers had been thinking the same.

'Isn't it?' Daish Reik had cocked his head to one side, face alight with challenge. What is it then?'

All his brothers had been watching him, silently urging him on, encouragement in their half smiles, relief in their eyes that he was the one taking the risk.

'You're looking to—' Kheda had searched for the right words. 'You're looking to be sure of the well-being of the domain,' he declared abruptly.

'This is no progress with wives and servants, slaves to do my bidding.' Daish Reik had shaken his head, his gaze intent. 'I make those visits to each island at the start of the dry season, to hear pleas, give judgement and read the omens for each village. You know that.'

'When they know you're coming.' Kheda had stood straighter, head on a level with Daish Reik's shoulder. 'When any misfortune can be tidied away and everything set fair for the most propitious omens.'

'We're not staying in any of the villages.' Daish Reik had spread his broad, thick-fingered hands tn apparent puzzlement. 'We're scarcely visiting them'

'You're talking to everyone we meet on the tracks between them,' Kheda had countered, folding his slender arms across his slightly muscled chest. 'When they're not all tense and anxious that their village shows itself to best advantage, when all the women aren't fussing that the food they have to offer is as good as the next village's, better if possible, and the men are worrying if such generosity is going to leave them hungry by the end of the dry season.' He had looked around the half circle of his brothers, reassured by their nods of agreement. 'This way you're not talking to people shoved forward by the spokesman, to tell you how wonderfully he's leading the village, how the young men organise the work between them with never a cross word.'

Then he had stopped, unsure, seeing amusement twisting Daish Reik's full mouth.

'Very astute, my son,' Daish Reik had said cordially. 'I don't imagine these tracks see half this quantity of feet when we're not in the area with a hunting party.' Then he had dropped into a crouch, holding Kheda's eyes with his own. 'But you are failing to see I have one more essential objective in these trips.'

Kheda had managed not to flinch, aware that all his brothers were watching, cudgelling his brains for something else. 'We share our meat with the villages, rather than eating up their stores. I imagine that leaves them better disposed to our presence.'

'Very true' Daish Reik had agreed: 'But there's more besides that.'

Kheda hadn't been able to see it so he'd squared his shoulders, lifting his chin. 'What might that be, my father?'

In one swift movement, Daish Reik had scooped up a handful of leaf litter and thrown it at Kheda. 'Having some fun and getting filthy without your mothers scolding us all into baths and clean clothes!' Springing up, he'd flung more handfuls at the other boys. 'The first one of you to get leaves down my tunic can help me make the fires tonight.'

It had been Ajil, brother now lost, zamonn and assiduous in his duties as one of the lowest ranked of Redigal Coron's retinue, who had won that much prized duty.

Kheda paused as he found himself beside a little spring carving a runnel through the clutter of the forest floor. Kneeling, he cupped water from the leaf-stained trickle in his hand and drank, throat aching as he swallowed.

Running a dripping hand over his beard, he forced himself to his feet once again. He ached, all over, from head still suffering from the lingering remnants of Ulla Safar's smothering smoke to feet scored and bruised by missteps in the darkness.

Redigal Coron. What about this plot that Telouet has got wind of? Could you have used that knowledge to bring Coron into an alliance with the Daish and Ritsem domains, instead of opting for this insane course? But would Coron have believed you? How long would it take to unravel the threads of such a conspiracy? No, it would all take too long and you cannot afford to take your eyes off the Chazen threat.

With a groan, he pushed himself on, tendrils from untamed berry bushes catching at his ragged trousers now dried to stiff creases with the silt of the river chafing at his skin. Away from the thinner brush where the Ulla islanders gathered their firewood, the forest closed around him, hostile, unyielding. Kheda drew Telouet's sword and began reluctantly cutting himself a path, doing his best to leave as little of a trail as he could.

Forgive me, Telouet, I know full well this is a task beneath your blade's dignity but it's all I have to hand.

Not that this is the first time I've been out in forest like this with a blade in my hand. That was another of Daish Reik's purposes, on those hunting trips. Was that something else that counted in my favour, that I realised it?

'Why do we have to learn all this?' His brother Kadi hadn't been complaining, just curious, as he had paused in the pattern of sword strokes Daish Reik's slave Agas had been drilling them all in.

'Since we've left everyone but Agas and a few guards behind to look after your mothers, it's as well you learn to defend yourselves.' Daish Reik had been shaving a length of hard, aromatic lilla wood into a feathery tmderstick with rapid strokes of his dagger.

'With these?'

The boys hadn't been given swords, just the long blunt-ended blades that hill men and hunters carried for carving a path through the undergrowth.

'Learn the moves with something as clumsy as that and they'll come all the easier when you deserve a real sword.' Daish Reik's knife had resumed its regular rasp.

Kheda had done his sword practice earlier. He had been sitting nearby, checking his bow and his arrows. Archery was another skill that those hunting trips had taught him. 'What must we do to deserve that?'

'Earn the respect of those swordsmen you expect to go before you into battle, by showing them you can do yourself everything with sword or arrow that you are asking of them.' Daish Reik had pointed the curved blade of his dagger straight at him, emerald eyes hard. 'Deserve their loyalty by showing you value the work that goes into supplying all your wants and more, that you value those who provide for you, whether it be the essentials of fire, water and food, or the luxuries of soft clothes, pretty trinkets and comfortable living.'

'Is that why you said we'd go hungry, if we couldn't catch our own meat on this trip?' Kheda had ventured, mindful of the chequered fowl he'd failed to bring down earlier.

'If you do not know what it is to lack such necessities, you won't see your people's anxiety if a spring fails in the dry season or a rainy-season storm leaves a village's saller rotting in the granary and all the firewood so sodden, aflame to dry it simply cannot be sustained.' Daish Reik's smile had been more challenge than reassurance. 'If you do not see such obvious things, how can you see the greater subtleties of portents? Share the concerns of the domain and its people and they will drive you to puzzle out the meaning of omens. Value the stuff of life, those that bring it to you and the domain that provides it, and people and domain both value you.'

I do value my domain and its people both and I'll risk the taint of magic by defying these wizards with a sword in my hand myself, before I let them stain and despoil the Daish islands. Redigal Coron can look to his own problems. I must find some way of defending the Daish domain.

Kheda cut down a half-dead tandra sapling rising from a stained tangle of last year's fibrous pods and suddenly found himself face to face with a startled hook-toothed hog. The beast grunted and shied away but it didn't flee. With the bristling crest running along its arched spine on a level with Kheda's midriff, it didn't need to. Planting its hooves in the remains of the rotting log where it had been foraging, it turned red-rimmed black eyes on Kheda with a belligerent snort. Its lips, slimy with spittle and dirt, drew back from the downward curve of its lower tusks, fangs the length of Kheda's dagger, yellow and spotted with leaf mould where it had been digging for grubs and beetles in the log. Its upper tusks curved the other way, coiling round to meet over the long flexible snout twitching at this new, intrusive scent. Kheda took a careful step backwards.

'Not fast enough to provoke it into a charge, nor yet slow enough for it to decide you're a threat and it may as well get its attack in first. If it does run at you, get out of its way, up a tree if you can. Those tusks can disembowel a man and leave him bleeding his life out on the forest floor. And remember, if it does kill you and no one finds your corpse, it'll come back when you're rotten meat and eat you itself.'

That's something else we learned on those hunting trips, isn't it, Daish Reik, that there are more ways than one of killing or catching every kind of prey and stealth a part of most of them. Challenging these wizards face to face would be a quick way of getting myself killed. I have to find some more subtle weapon. Show me I am on the right path here, hog.

Kheda halted and waited. The hook-toothed hog looked at him, almost comical as it peered past the twisted tusks in front of its eyes. With another snort and a shake of its mottled brown and black hide, it turned tail and disappeared into the all-enveloping leaves of a sardberry thicket, the forest soon muffling the sound of its retreat.

A flock of little scarlet-headed waxbeaks swooped down to land on the ravaged log, trilling with excitement as they pecked at insects disturbed by the foraging hog. Kheda realised the trees and bushes all around were bustling with birds of all sizes and colours stirring to greet the new day. He hurried on through the trees, moving back down the long shallow slope of the river valley. Cautious, he looked out across the patchwork of vegetable fields and sailer plots and to intermittent huts of Ulla Safar's people marking out the line of the distant river, narrower here but still wider than any in the Daish domain. Mists still hung in swathes across the low-lying land, drifting into rags and tatters where breezes tugged at them.

There it was. Indistinct yet unmistakable, a raw outcrop of black rock broke through the valley side, stark intrusion shocking against the soft green, irresistibly drawing the eye to its brutal shape. Sheer sides rose up as clean and glistening as meat fresh cut with a fine-honed blade. No plants had managed a foothold on that slick surface. On the foremost crest, a few scrubby bushes had sprouted, only to be crushed beneath the sprawling weight of an enormous nest, built by the silver eagles who had claimed the crag for their own. The ground below the crag was untouched. None would dare till it and risk being touched by the great birds' shadows, wide as the span of a grown man's arms, as they wove their portents in the skies. Only in the thirstiest season would they approach to draw water from the pool beneath the unfailing waterfall tumbling in gouts of brilliant white down the midnight face of the rock. No matter what the season, no one would approach the ornately carved gate in the high wall that surrounded the topless tower standing just to the south of the crag. No one except a warlord or his acknowledged wife.

Kheda began making his way towards it, finding a path winding through the remnants of the much-harvested brushwood. Soon stands of berry bushes and little lilla trees marked the edge of proper cultivation. There was no fruit to be had though, no matter how fiercely Kheda's belly griped with hunger. Then a few black-veined ruddy leaves wilting beneath a lilla sapling caught his eye. Hira beets. Dropping to his knees, Kheda dug with his dagger until he uncovered the roots. Hands clumsy, he peeled them, the dark juice staining fingers and dagger alike. Wizened and leathery at this season, they still had some sweetness as he chewed them resolutely.

Let that chance find be a good omen, like the hog, that I'm on the right path.

Meagre as it was, this food put new heart in him. Kheda hurried on, seeing the great black crag grow brighter with every touch of the strengthening daylight. The mists shifted and drifted around it, shapes half seen tempting his eyes and memory but disappearing before he could decide just what they were. Following the lie of the land, slipping gradually downhill, the path took him more than half the way to the great black crag before it swerved in a prudent detour back towards the huddles of close-shuttered houses. Kheda looked warily over towards the river. He could see a few figures now, tiny and indistinct in the mists, stooped over nursery beds where the sailer seedlings were being cherished, waiting for the longed-for rains to soak deep into the earth-banked fields lying hoed and ready.

There's a time for stealth and this isn't it. This is no time to be seen and hailed, asked who you are and what you're doing, half naked and filthy and yet carrying a sword twice the value of any of those houses and everything in it. Not that any of them would recognise you in this state, not as the mighty lord of the Daish domain, reader of portents, giver of laws, healer and protector of all his islands.

Leaving the track, Kheda cut a straight path towards the white stone wall surrounding the tower of silence. A perfect circle, it was topped with sharp peaks of opaque white crystal and broken only by a single gate of ebony stained with the verdigris that had long since dulled the bronze fittings to a murky green. Kheda laid a scratched and dirty hand on the latch and, pushing the gate open, slid inside the compound. His breathing sounded harsh and ragged in his ears as he leaned against the wall, relief suddenly robbing him of any strength for an endless instant.

The solid pillar of the tower rose above him. Broad, shallow steps wound up the outside in a slow spiral for those who would bring the honoured dead of the domain here, to lay them down on the empty, open platform at the top, its four pillars set in a cardinal square. There were no rails or barriers. For anyone engaged in such hallowed duties to complete them in safety or, by contrast, to fall to injury or death was a potent omen either way. Kheda walked slowly across the dusty space, intent on putting the tower between himself and the gate. Out of long habit, he noted the few plants that had seeded themselves inside the enclosure.

Sailer stalks rattling dry kernels cloaked in rough husks; a good omen that, for the fertile land all around supplying the vital harvest to come. That tiny sapling already has the distinctive leaves of the bloodfever tree, though it's a fragile promise of health for the people hereabouts. I wouldn't be any too sanguine for local villages, not with the size of that serpent bush thriving next to it.

That was one of your other purposes on our forest hunting trips, wasn't it, my father, teaching us to recognise our healing plants.

'See these upthrust ridged fingers hidden among the sard-berry leaves? This is a serpent bush and it's as vicious as any snake, its sap just as venomous. Never touch it; these spines will break off in your fingers and fester. Don't cut it; the juice will blister your skin. Make sure you never gather any in with dead wood for your fire. Meat cooked over it will kill you.'

'Then what purpose does it serve?' Kheda had stammered. He'd not long begun his herbal studies but the one thing he had already learned was every plant was supposed to have a function.

Daish Reik had looked at him for a long moment of silence. 'It serves as a warning. Let that be sufficient for now.'

It was only later, when I was left your sole son, searching the tomes of herb lore in the tower for all the teaching your untimely death had denied me, that I learned its full potential among the subtler means of attacking one's enemies, of inflicting timely indispositions and discreet wasting sicknesses. Is this one of the malevolent plants that Ulla Safar uses to clear inconveniences like Orhan's mother from his path?

Is this where Ulla Safar brings those pathetic little corpses he writes out of this domain's records barely before they've drawn breath? Does he deem them important enough to be raised to the silent heights, that the birds and the insects might disperse their essence as widely as possible over the domain? What influence could they have, such tiny children, for good or ill on the domain? Perhaps he simply buries them, like humble islanders with no greater ambition than returning all that they have become to the place where they lived out their lives. Or does he deny them even that grace, since he doesn't deem them worthy of even the chance of life, something even the scrawniest offspring of the lowest dirt farmer can claim in the Daish islands. Does he burn the tiny bodies or throw them to the tides to be washed far from the Archipelago? I wouldn't put it past him. Still, at least it doesn't smell as if he's murdered anyone with a blood claim on the domain of late.

Kheda sat with his back to the tower and looked up at the steps rising above his head. The still air was fresh with the transient cool of dawn, no carrion stench drifting down from the tower. There were a few scraps of cloth on the ground, sun-bleached and rain-faded, some dull white rounded pieces that could only be bone. The greatest concentration of both was clustered around the base of the serpent bush.

'It serves as a warning. Let that be sufficient for now.'

Kheda stared unseeing at the blank stone wall in front of him. There was no sound but the steady thrumming rush of the ceaseless waterfall hidden from view by the enclosure wall. The sound made Kheda thirsty again, his mouth as dry as sun-bleached cotton. Resolutely ignoring it, he marshalled the arguments he would need honed and ready, if he was going to keep the upper hand in the inevitable argument with Janne, to convince her of the truth that had come to him in the darkness of the night, alone on the silent river bank. Despite his determination, he still didn't feel ready by the time he heard Janne's sharp voice rising above reluctant steps drawing close to the gate in the wall.' He sat, motionless, forcing himself to breathe slow and careful, trying to still the pounding of his heart.

'Wait at the bottom of the rise.' Janne's voice outside the gate was harsh with weariness. She rounded on some low rumble of protest from Birut. 'Because I do not want any distractions.'

Tense, Kheda waited as she lifted the latch, entered and closed the gate firmly behind her. He heard her heave a tired sigh before her soft tread approached the tower. 'Kheda?'

He stood and looked cautiously around the curve of the stone. 'I'm here. Who's with you?' he asked in the same low tone.

Janne took an impulsive step forward, hands outstretched, before she halted, hugging herself instead. 'Birut, a detachment of our own swordsmen and some of Ulla's men who insisted we could not make such a journey without fitting escort. Don't worry; I've left them well out of earshot and Birut will make sure no one trespasses on my grief.' Her face showed all the strain of the long and troubled night but she was immaculately dressed regardless, a white shawl of silky goat's hair wrapped around the shoulders of a grass-green dress with a pattern of dancing herons. Braided close, her hair was adorned with chains of emeralds mounted in silver.

'How's Telouet?' That abrupt concern overrode what Kheda had intended to say.

'His arm is broken and the wound looks dangerously inflamed but he's awake and says his sickness is past.' Janne paused, anger and hurt naked in her tired eyes behind their mask of cosmetics. 'Frantic about you, I might add. What am I to tell him?'

'What did you tell Ulla Safar?' Kheda had questions of his own before he'd be giving any answers.

'That every portent must be sought, every omen consulted as to where the river might have carried you.' Janne settled her shawl lower on her arms, speaking with something of her customary self-possession. 'Since visiting a tower of silence is the sole divination that's a wife's province, I said I would come here and seek some dream to give us a hint as to your fate. As I have not slept, the chances of some guidance must be all the greater.' She looked at him meaningfully.

Kheda looked past her to the gate, face thoughtful. 'What signs has Safar pointed at, in his interpretation of events?'

'He has yet to devote himself to such considerations,' Janne said with asperity 'He feels the first priority is organising search parties to scour the banks downstream for your corpse. He wished me peace in my meditations and, of course, to let him know at once whatever image was in my mind on waking. He said I could have Orhan to assist me in divining its meaning.'

'How generous,' said Kheda dryly. 'You should keep an eye on Orhan though. He may be looking to the Daish domain for an ally. He certainly saved me from death at least once last night.'

'Could that be why Safar tried to have you killed?' Hope rose in Janne's voice. 'Could the Chazen troubles have nothing to do with the night's calamities?'

'I don't know and I don't really think I care,' Kheda said brusquely.

Janne was taken aback. 'We have to know what lies behind all this. This is our first chance in years to get the upper hand over Safar. We have to decide the best time for your return, to our best advantage. Redigal Coron is all but shoulder-to-shoulder with Ritsem Caid now. Safar was summoning his people to mourn your death when Coron stepped in and forbade it, insisting there's every chance you're still alive.'

'But what if I am not?' Kheda asked softly.

Janne looked puzzled. 'What do you mean?'

'What if I am dead?' he persisted.

Janne stared at him, still uncomprehending. 'Don't say such a thing, not below a tower of silence. You tempt the future, my husband.'

'What if I am dead, my first wife?' repeated Kheda, steel in his voice.

Janne cupped her face in her hands, closing her eyes. 'Then Sirket inherits, if we can get word to him to make sure he declares your death and his accession before anyone else can do it.' Her eyes opened with a snap. 'Which is why Safar is searching so diligently for your corpse. If he can prove your death before Sirket has a chance to declare himself, the domain is masterless, the chain of succession broken.'

'To be seized by whoever may prove strongest.' A humourless smile twisted Kheda's mouth. 'Safar must be all but spilling his seed at the prospect.'

'Caid would never stand for it.' Janne looked appalled. 'It would be war between Ulla and Ritsem.'

'It's a good thing there's no corpse to be found then.' Kheda shrugged with sour satisfaction. 'Sirket must declare himself as soon as possible. If Telouet's fit to travel, send him. Everyone will suspect what that signifies but no one can challenge you, not as long as you stay here and encourage Safar in his search parties and dragging the river bed.'

'What are you saying?' A sharp frown creased Janne's brow. 'You want Sirket to take on the domain, an untried boy between Ulla Safar's malevolence to the north and reeking savages wielding magic to the south? What are you thinking?' Barely catching herself before her voice rose to a shout, her words rang with suppressed anger.

'As long as there is no body to display, for weeping and lamentations over such a tragic accident, Safar cannot move against Sirket.' Kheda kept his words calm. 'Doing so would be as good as saying he knows I am dead because he killed me himself. Caid will never stand for it and I don't imagine Coron will either. His retinue won't let him for one thing. That reminds me, you must talk to Telouet as soon as he's got his wits about him. He's heard word those Redigal zamorin are planning their own change of dynasty. They won't want Safar starting a new trend for seizing disputed domains by force of arms.' Kheda ticked off his next argument on his fingers. 'If Sirket is warlord, facing this threat of magic, Caid and Coron will back him, out of self-interest as much as compassion. They might have left me to make shift against unknown invaders as best I could but they won't see Sirket as anything like a strong enough bulwark between them and that danger.'

'And you do?' snapped Janne, incredulous. 'He's barely grown!'

'I have considerable confidence in him,' Kheda replied firmly. 'Still more since he'll have you and Rekha to support and advise him. He's not yet married, so no one will be expecting either of you to quit the domain. He'd better not wed,' he added sharply. 'I know it'll be expected but let him adopt Mesil as a son, if you feel it necessary to demonstrate the succession is secure.'

Janne just stared at him. 'And what of Sain?'

Kheda was thrown off his stride. 'What of her?'

'You'll let her think you're dead, that her babe is to be fatherless? You'd condemn the child to birth under such ill omen, all the while knowing it to be falsehood?'

'If it is no true portent, the child cannot be harmed by it.' Shaken, Kheda tried not to show it.

'You expect Sain to conceal such a truth?' Janne shook her head, disbelieving.

'No,' said Kheda gruffly. 'She must not know the truth, nor must Rekha. You must not breathe a word of this to anyone, not even Sirket, or Telouet.' He swallowed a sudden tightness in his throat. 'Telouet must become Sirket's body slave. There is no one I would rather trust either of them to.'

'Kheda, the children will be devastated! Rekha will grieve as you cannot imagine. It's a good thing Sain's all but reached her time; otherwise such news would likely make her lose the babe. But you're not dead. Why are we talking like this?' Janne ran silver-ringed hands into her thick hair, gripping painfully tight, before staring into her husband's eyes. 'Disappearing for a night, even a few days, if only to save yourself and to disconcert Safar, yes, I can see that, but what can we possibly gain from persisting in this folly?'

'We came here looking for help against the magic that's afflicting the Chazen domain.' Kheda reached forward to disentangle Janne's hands from her hair, holding them close between his own. 'We find everyone playing the same old games of suspicion and intrigue, nursing festering grudges and seeing every augury through the twisted prism of their own hatreds. We cannot afford to get caught up in this tangle of squabbles and intrigue when unknown savages are wielding brutal magic no more than a few days' sail to our south.'

'So you propose to play dead?' Shrillness in Janne's words cut the stillness like a knife.

'Safar cannot distract us with any more attempts on my life if I do, or worse, actually succeed. We talked of sending word to the north, remember?' Kheda held her hands tight between his own. 'To ask if any domains would share their tactics for dealing with barbarian wizards from the unbroken lands?'

'We agreed you would suggest it, simply as a ploy.' Janne narrowed her eyes at him. 'To make Safar and the others believe aiding the Daish domain themselves was lesser evil than inviting strangers into these reaches.'

'I saw firedrakes in the sky last night, Janne, burning a path to the north. What if I follow them, go looking for such lore, in all truthfulness?' Kheda swallowed hard a second time. 'You said yourself, the price we'll have to pay for aid from Ulla Safar and Redigal Coron will beggar our domain for ten years or more. What if I could find some other means, some arcane knowledge that would enable us to drive this vileness out of Chazen and into the southern ocean?'

'We can hold them off, with Ritsem Caid at our back, and Redigal Coron,' Janne protested. 'If you are there to lead the Daish domain, that is.'

Kheda shook his head resolutely. 'The best we could hope for is holding them to the Chazen isles. How long can we do that, especially once the rains have passed? Simply stopping their advance is no answer, not beyond a season or so. We need to drive them out of Chazen isles and Daish alike, clear down to the southern ocean. I truly believe the only way we'll find the means to do that is if I seek it in the northern domains. I can travel through the rains and be back before the dry season reopens the seaways.'

'And what becomes of Sirket when you return to us?' Janne burst out, pulling her hands free of Kheda's, heedless of her shawl falling to the ground. 'If he declares himself warlord, you have to fight him to regain your place. How's that to be resolved without one of you killing the other?' Fury all but choked her.

'Sirket is in no danger from me.' But Janne had thought he might be, if only for a moment, even after all they had shared together. Kheda felt cold despite the heat of the sun now rising above the tree-crowned crest of the valley side. 'He can step aside; the Daish domain answers to no one else, as to how we manage our affairs. And having proved his quality in this trial, his eventual succession will be that much more secure.'

'And what if you don't come back?' Janne's eyes were brimming with tears. 'Don't go! Don't risk yourself like this—' Words failed her.

'I have to.' Kheda drew a deep breath as he bent to pick up Janne's fallen wrap. 'I have to find some way of countering this magic and it's plain I'll not find it here or in any of our neighbours' domains. None of them sees the peril that lies over the southern horizon for the danger it is. There's more, besides. I couldn't read the portents on the Chazen beach, did I tell you that? I'm beginning to wonder if the taint of this magic is spreading ahead of these wizards, corrupting the omens that should be convincing Caid and Coron.'

'What?' Janne stared, disbelieving, ignoring the proffered shawl.

'I saw none of this.' Angry, Kheda waved the white wrap in an arc encompassing the tower, the crag and the whole Ulla domain. 'I worked every divination I thought appropriate before we set sail, you know that, and a few that I give precious little credence, just in case. I sought every possible guidance, alert for any potential warning. I saw none of this,' he repeated bitterly. 'I had no notion that Safar's hostility could reach such a pitch as to have me killed. I saw no augury of sickness, real or induced, nor any sign of a fire to threaten us.' He was twisting the fine silky wool until it cut painfully into his palms. 'The only sign I have seen that can have any meaning is last night's shooting stars. At the very least I have to travel north until I'm free of this miasma and can see our path clear again. I cannot lead the domain in a fight against wizards if the touch of that magic is cutting me off from every sign that should guide me. I would only lead the domain into darkness and death.'

'And how is Sirket to do better?' Janne waved frantic hands, bracelets jingling.

'Sirket did do better,' Kheda said ruefully. 'He did see peril waiting here for me, when he consulted the triune candles, even if it was unclear. I don't think the same confusion is afflicting him. Maybe it's because I went south, actually faced these wizards' monsters.'

'Caid and Coron haven't. Why should they be afflicted?' Janne's anger was rising above her distress. 'Besides, you assured Itrac that to be an unwilling victim of magic is to remain innocent.'

'And half the books in the tower library argue different.' Kheda threw up his hands. 'I don't know. All I do know is we're finding no help here and we need help, Janne, we need it. It's my duty to find it and the only path I can see offering any hope leads north.'

Janne snatched back her shawl and wrapped it close around her shoulders. 'And what are we to do, my lord and husband, while you are following this path?' Her voice was cold but a single tear traced a shining line down her cheek.

Kheda cleared his throat. 'Make sure anyone fleeing north from Chazen is kept in our southernmost islands. They can fish from the shore but not from boats. Don't let Sirket get lured into an advance if the invaders do come north,' he said with more urgency. 'He must fight where he can, kill where he can but don't let him go on the attack, not until I have brought some means to counter the sorcery. If the savages should attack in the rains, our people should fall back, hide in the forests, keep themselves safe until we can carry the attack to these wizards with real hope of success.'

Janne closed her eyes on more tears, shoulders trembling. 'Until you return?'

Kheda embraced her, holding her tight. 'Until I bring whatever lore the northern warlords use to keep magic's evil from invading their domains, to defend our children and their future.'

Janne nodded mutely, stiff within the circle of his arms. 'Tell me, how do your propose to travel north, all but bare-arsed and with no status to call on?'

'I'll cross the central heights and make for the trading beaches on the north side of the island. I will take an oar in a merchant galley in return for passage north.' Kheda shrugged. 'I'll find some clothing on my way. I believe the Ulla domain owes me that much at least. I can feed myself from the forest.'

Janne broke free of his hug and wiped away her tears with the fringe of her shawl, careful not to smudge the green and silver paint around her eyes. 'The Ulla domain owes the Daish a great deal more than tunic and trews for the loss of its lord under Ulla Safar's hospitality.' Her mouth set with new purpose.

'Then you and Rekha can make sure they pay, in arms and men to hold back these wizards until I get back,' Kheda said vehemently.

'How will I know when you have found this lore to drive out magic, that you're on your way home?' Janne looked at him. 'You'll have no message birds, no couriers.'

Kheda scratched at an itch in his beard. 'We'd better keep it secret, that I am still alive, until I am safely back in Daish waters or, better yet, carrying the fight to these invaders in the Chazen isles. I don't want to give Safar a chance to finish last night's work or to get caught up in explaining myself to any other domain. They can find out what I've been doing once I've driven these wizards out. That should put paid to most of their questions of itself.' He paused, thinking. 'There's a tower of silence on the thousand-oyster isle, do you know the one I mean?'

'Where your great grandsire and his elder sons were dashed to death on the reefs.' Janne nodded, visibly determined to get a grip on her unruly emotions.

'No one will be going there until the pearl harvest.' Kheda nodded. 'That's where I'll head for. You can meet me there and tell me how things stand in my absence. Then we can decide how best to go forward.'

'I'll send a trusted slave to keep vigil there,' Janne said slowly. 'Because the sea has yet to give up your body.'

'I will be back as soon as I can,' Kheda promised.

Janne looked straight at him. 'While you're looking for lore to drive out magic, search out as many rites of purification as you can. We have to rid ourselves of every stain these wizards leave.' She shook herself, her white shawl fluttering like the wings of a bird. 'I don't think we have anything else to discuss. I'll return to Derasulla.'

'So soon?' Kheda was surprised. 'Ulla Safar will be expecting you to look for some guidance in a dream here.'

'I've changed my mind,' Janne said with steely precision. 'That is ever a wife's prerogative. If he presses me, I shall simply become distraught with grief.' Her face was cold and calm.

Kheda drew a deep breath. 'So this is farewell, my wife, until the thousand-oyster isle, that is.'

'Farewell, my husband.' Janne turned abruptly towards the gate, lifting the latch and sliding through it. Birut's voice approached, concern lost in the solid clunk of ebony on stone and the rattle of the handle.

Kheda slid down to sit at the base of the lofty tower, struggling not to yield to the doubts suddenly clustering round him.

How long to leave it before escaping the confines of the enclosure? Long enough to avoid being seen by Janne's departing escort but not so late that some labourer in the sailer fields or some child sent to gather firewood raises a hue and cry after this unknown man profaning the sanctity of the tower of silence. Then it's into the forest and head for the heights, for the passes that will take you over to the northern side of the island, to the trading beaches and passage north. How am I to secure that?

'How am I to do this?' The knife in his hand had been as long as his forearm but had still looked entirely inadequate to Kheda, faced with the thick brindled belly hide of the dead water ox.

'Think it through,' Daish Reik had said firmly. 'Decide what you must do first. Do that and then you'll see the next step.'

Hunting for dappled deer, they had surprised the water ox drowsing where a stream formed a pool around a stubborn rock in its path. Daish Reik would never have chosen such a quarry with the children in the party but now it was roused, the beast was far too dangerous to leave. He had shouted at Kheda to get all the boys into the trees, Agas already throwing hunting spears to the other swordsmen. The warriors had fanned out into a half circle, the broad leaf-shaped spearheads held low, as the ox lumbered out of the water brandishing its vicious, down-curved horns, incongruously draped with a tendril of the waterpepper weed it had been browsing on.

Two men and Agas had challenged the beast with shouts and taunts. It had charged them, the force somewhat dissipated by its inability to chose a target, but it had still sent one of the men flying with a great buffet of its brutal head. His valour had served its purpose when Daish Reik had driven his spear into its back, in between the animal's angular shoulder blades, deep into its vitals. Its knees had buckled, bowels voiding, collapsing even as it still sought to gore the fallen swordsman.

'Kheda, deal with it.' Daish Reik had abandoned the ox as soon as he was sure it was dead, turning to salve the horrifying bruises on the man's chest, tearing up his own tunic to wrap his broken ribs. 'That's too much meat to leave for the jungle cats.'

Which was why Kheda had stood before the massive, stinking, steaming carcass.

'How am I to do this?'

How was he to get the leathery hide off without ruining it? How was he to gut it without puncturing the endless loops and pouches of its entrails? How was he to read any signs in the heavy, slippery liver before the sheen that reflected the unseen future dried in the heat? How was he supposed to direct the other boys in butchering something that weighed as much as all of them put together? Where were they going to find the perfume leaves to smoke this much meat?

'Decide what you must do first. Do that and then you'll see the next step.'

Tense, waiting until the sounds of Janne's departure had subsided, Kheda lifted the latch of the gate and slipped out of the silent tower's precinct.

First things first. Which means you want a tunic and a belt to hang Telouet's sword on, since the one Daish Reik made for you from the water ox's hide is back in Derasulla.