Alchymist (19 page)

'Gyrull,'
he cried, twisting around in her claws so he could see her face. 'I know what's
happened at the node.'

The
movement put her off-balance just as an unexpected gust jerked her upwards.
Torn from her grasp, Gilhaelith fell towards the dark waters, far below.

Jal-Nish
had taken charge of the clanker-hauling operation. Day and night his short
stocky figure was everywhere, issuing orders and threats, and maintaining
control of every aspect of the vast operation. The generals together could not
have done in a week what he achieved in the first three days. The platinum mask
reflected the light of the pyres by night, and the blinding sun by day. He was
not seen to eat, drink or sleep in all that time.

Rumour
of what he had done to his son spread, and when that mask appeared on their
doorstep none dared refuse him. Eighty-two thousand soldiers, camp followers,
peasants and slaves had been harnessed into teams. Neither women nor children,
nor the wounded who could still walk, had been spared. Another eighteen
thousand horses, buffalo and other beasts of burden had been assembled for the
monumental task. Every usable clanker, more than five thousand of them, had to
be dragged from the festering muck of the battlefield onto solid ground.

The
haulers fell dead in their hundreds, hearts bursting under the strain. Many
more collapsed, and those who could not get up quickly enough died where they
lay, for Jal-Nish would not allow a moment's pause to get them out. He ordered
the clankers, on their wooden skids, dragged over the fallen, as a bloody spur
to the rest to do their duty. They did, and they kept dying.

Finally
they'd heaved the clankers out of the putrid wallow, but that was only the
beginning. They needed to move the machines more than six leagues to the field
of the nearest node, and already man and beast were exhausted.

The
agonising days went by. Nish's sunburnt, whip-torn back was covered in
festering sores. Already lean from months of privation, after seven days of
slavery he was so thin that he barely left a shadow. He could not sleep; could
scarcely eat the slops they were fed on, which had a rotten stench and crawled
with maggots, so desperate had the supply situation become. The army's supply
wagons had been hauled by clankers, and half had been kept back, leagues to the
east, in case the enemy overran the main camp, as they had. Most of the
supplies here had been trampled into the mud. Without them, and with many more
mouths to feed, everyone had been reduced to quarter rations. The slaves'
portion came from that which even the guard dogs wouldn't eat.

Xervish
Flydd looked unchanged. He'd been whipped even more than Nish, but was taking
it better. He seemed, and it felt strange when Nish first had the thought, at
home here. Not as though he belonged, but rather that he had adapted perfectly
to his slavery. Flydd was a driven man. He was going to bring down the Council
and nothing else mattered. Pain and privation he simply endured.

Tonight,
through the smoke from five thousand camp fires, a blood-red moon, a few days
past full, was rising over the eastern hills. Not a tree or bush remained and
they were now burning grass and chunks of weathered tar. The army had stripped
the land to its rocky bones.

Today
had been the hardest. They were well out of the battlefield bog now, moving
down the valley, and the overseer had driven them like the beasts they were, to
make up lost time. Nish's boots were falling to pieces and would soon be gone.
Slaving barefoot over this stony ground would cripple him, and the fate of
crippled slaves was not something he liked to contemplate.

The
whip master had allowed them a scant two hours' rest this evening and it was
nearly over. ‘I can't go on,’ Nish thought, as he had many times, but each
time, as the lash coiled around his belly and through the rags of his shirt,
pain drove him to one last effort.

Flydd
was slumped beside him, head between his knees, snoring. He took advantage of
every opportunity to rest. The moon lifted itself clear of the horizon, showing
mostly its dark, mottled face, said to be an ill omen. Nish did not believe in
omens but its bloody visage made him shudder.

'Surr
...' he began.

'Don't
call me surr. I'm a slave, just like vou.'

'Thanks
for the reminder. Xervish?'

'What?'

'Where's
Irisis?' Nish's thoughts had often turned to her over the past days.

'How
would I know? A long way from here, I hope.'

'I
hope she's safe.' And didn't hear about my disgrace. Nish couldn't bear for her
to think ill of him.

Something
scuttled across his field of view, slipping into the darkness further along the
line of slaves. Nish felt no curiosity -that was a luxury no slave could
afford. The figure flitted out again into the darkness. He yawned, closed his
eyes . ..

A
whip crack dragged Nish out of sleep. Instinctively he flinched, but it was
just the overseer, practising on someone nearby. Nish dared not drift off again;
sleeping slaves were a favourite target. He eyed the overseer, who kept raising
something the size of a brick to his mouth. He liked to whip as he ate. As the
man approached, Nish caught the aroma of freshly baked bread, a whole loaf. He
would have killed the brute to get his hands on it. He thumped his clenched
fist into the dirt.

'Easy,'
said Flydd beside him. 'That'll only get you another lashing. Keep your head
down.'

'I'll
bet that bread was meant for us.'

'I
dare say it was. Don't think about it.'

'I
can't help it,' Nish muttered, drooling uncontrollably.

The
little shadow flitted behind the massive bulk of the overseer.

'Did
you see that?' said Nish.

'Someone's
trying to steal the overseer's dinner. I wouldn't want to be the lad when he's
caught.'

Nish
shivered. The overseer stopped, sniffed the air, took the coiled whip from his
shoulder and cracked it, reflectively, against a slave's belly. The man
screamed. The overseer chuckled and tore at the bread. The hand holding the
loaf fell to his side.

The
shadow sprang, snatched the loaf and bolted. The big man cursed, swung the whip
and caught the flying figure around the knees, sending it crashing to the
ground. Within seconds the overseer was on the youth. A wail rang out; a very
familiar cry.

'That's
Ullii!' Nish hissed, pulling himself up with the harness. The other slaves
began to grumble. 'What's she doing here?'

"Trying
to survive.' Flydd was also on his feet, rubbing his scarred thigh.

'He'll
kill her.'

'Or
worse,' Flydd said grimly.

'What
are we going to do?'

Flydd,
still rubbing his left thigh, did not answer.

'Leave
her alone, you vicious scum!' Nish bellowed.

The
overseer whirled and, crushing Ullii under one brawny arm, strode to the head
of the line, lashing indiscriminately. Something fell and was crushed underfoot
— her goggles.

Ullii
convulsed, almost succeeding in getting free. 'Nish!' she cried despairingly.
'Nish, help me.'

Her
cry tore at him. All the slaves were on their feet now. Nish wrenched at his
harness, which did not budge: no slave had escaped from this overseer.

'Stop
it, you damn fool,' hissed Flydd. 'Get out of my way.'

Giving
his thigh one last rub, Flydd threw out his right hand. Rays roared from his
fingertips to strike the overseer in thebelly, just missing the squirming
figure of Ullii. The man was hurled backwards as if he'd been struck with a
catapult ball. Flydd moved one finger and the ray severed his harness, followed
by Nish's, before fading out.

Ullii
scrambled free and ran into Nish's arms. 'Nish, Nish!' she sobbed. 'Save me.'

'This
is no time for a family reunion,' Flydd growled. 'Come on.'

He
bent over the prone figure of the overseer, taking the whip and the man's belt,
which he buckled around his bony hips. It held a sheath knife, a metal pannikin
and a pouch that jingled. The loaf he broke into three chunks, handing Nish and
Ullii a portion each.

The
other slaves in their team began to cry out, holding up their chains and
begging to be set free.

'You
have an important duty here,' said Flydd senten-tiously. 'To haul clankers.'
From the vicious cursing that followed, the slaves did not appreciate that duty
as well as they might have. Flydd turned to Nish. 'Take one mouthful and save
the rest. After me.'

Ignoring
the wails and beseeching cries of the harnessed slaves, he bolted towards the
south-east, where a cluster of low, rock-crowned hills broke the horizon. As
Nish set Ullii down, she clutched his hand and they ran for their lives. Flydd,
despite his age and a limp like a broken-legged crab, was at least fifty paces
ahead, almost out of sight in the moonlight.

Ullii
ran easily at Nish's side and they caught Flydd as the slope began to rise. He
had slowed to a fast walk. 'What did you do back there?' said Nish.

'Later!'
Flydd said, hobbling badly now.

He
did not look well. Nish guessed it was aftersickness, which all mancers
suffered after using their Art.

Flydd
looked over his shoulder. Nish did too. There were lights everywhere along the
line of the clankers, and someone was running with a torch back towards the
officers' tents. More urgently, a group of figures with torches had formed
lines at the head of the clankers and was moving in their direction. A bellow
came to them on the wind.

'It's
a search party,' said Flydd. 'The first of many. Jal-Nish will hunt me to the
furthest corners of the world, but he's not going to get me.' He set off again.

'He'll
hunt me just as hard,' said Nish. 'My father has betrayed me, Ullii. What am I
to do?'

'My
family cast me out to die.' said Ullii.

There
was no answer to that. He squeezed her hand and followed, walking awkwardly,
for the stitching on the side of his right boot had come undone and the sole
was flapping. The other boot was nearly as decrepit.

'Why
didn't you free the slaves, surr?' said Nish.

'Weren't
you listening?' Flydd growled. 'Hauling clankers is vital work.'

'Isn't
that a bit hypocritical?' panted Nish. 'After all —’

'I
have more vital work,' Flydd said tersely, 'and no one else can do it. But feel
free to go back, if your conscience troubles you.'

'It's
more flexible than I'd thought,' Nish said hastily.

'So
I've noticed,' Flydd said dryly. 'Besides, if I did set them free, they'd want
to come with us, and then we'd never get away.' He broke into a pained,
lurching trot. 'We'll go around this hill, not over it,' he continued. 'Else we
might be seen in the moonlight.'

Beyond,
to left and right, were more hills — not a range but a scatter of individual
mounds that seemed to grow higher in the distance. All were topped with rocky
crowns and a bristle of shrubbery or scrubby trees.

'Good
land for running,' said Flydd, 'though not for hiding. They'll have the dogs on
our trail before too long.

'What
are we going to do?' said Nish.

'I
haven't the faintest idea.'

They
followed a goat track that wound between the next pair of hills. The bushes
were tall enough to conceal them, though the moon lit up the path, which was a
blessing. The scrub was full of thorns and burrs, painful to negotiate in the
dark.

By
the time they reached the other side of the hill the moon was halfway up the
sky. They stopped where a ledge of resistant rock stuck out over the slope like
the edge of a plate hanging over a tahle.

'Let's
take a breather' grunted Flydd, sitting down.

'How
did you do that?' said Nish, who was bursting with curiosity. 'If the node is
dead, how can you do magic at all?'

'Mind
your own business.'

Ullii
crouched beside the scrutator. 'Does your leg hurt, Xervish?' She peeled away
the torn flaps of fabric covering his left thigh. They were darkly stained in
the moonlight. Ullii drew back, visibly distressed.

'More
than somewhat,' Flydd replied. 'I'll just dress this, then —’ A howl drifted to
them on the wind, followed by a furious baying. He rose to his feet with an
effort, muttering, 'I thought we'd have a longer lead.'

They
hurried down the stony slope. The sole of Nish's boot was practically off but
he couldn't stop to fix it. The path narrowed, the scrub closing overhead until
it resembled a rabbit run.

Towards
the bottom, Flydd, who was limping worse than ever, stopped. 'Ullii, can you
smell water?'

'Of
course,' she said.

'Lead
the way, quick as you can.'

She
went down on hands and knees, crept under a bush, turned left and scuttled
along a path that had not been visible to Nish. He followed. Thorns tore at his
clothing and caught in his hair. Ullii was out of sight, making so little sound
that he could not tell which way she'd gone.