Moontide 02 - The Scarlet Tides (33 page)

*

It took much persuasion, but the lamiae finally resolved to seek Hebusalim. It would be a slow process, as their scouts had seen Inquisitors searching the coastal cliffs. But night-travel through the woods was possible, for the lamiae used gnostic heat-sensing, a self-taught skill in which they were as proficient as any Arcanum-trained mage. They set out in small groups, initially covering only a few miles each night, but once they had left the heavily choked undergrowth of the Silacian hills and entered the pine forests of eastern Noros it was easier. Alaron mostly rode on Kekropius’ back. They were managing more than fifteen miles a night, but it wasn’t fast enough: by his reckoning the Bridge was two thousand miles away; at their current rate it would take six months to reach Pontus. And how in Hel they were going to make it over the Bridge he had no idea.

But there were moments of inspiration: a rare sea-view at dawn revealed a dim shape on the horizon that he realised could only be the volcanic island of Phaestos. At last all those geography lessons were useful: he knew it to be uninhabited, after the last eruptions in 886, and it offered a way to cut hundreds of miles from their journey. Mesuda sent scouts swimming towards it while the main group rested for a few days.

Alaron felt as if he’d stepped into a very strange dream. Despite the lamiae’s human characteristics, they were very much an alien species. They ate fish primarily, wolfing it down whole to a main stomach below the hips, at the top of the snake body. Kekropius told him the males had two hearts to power their long bodies; they could move at dazzling speeds, and could climb anything. They were terrifying in their strength and anger, but though they quickly
reached physical maturity, they were like capricious children, swiftly fascinated or bored. The Elders’ role was somewhere between older sibling and parent.

While contemplating the alien nature of his companions, Alaron had an idea. Kekropius sent him to talk to Reku. The ancient lamia woman – at twenty-two, she was declining fast – was perched on her own on a low bluff, beneath which the refugees were camping. Most of the males were hunting while the females were preparing cooking pits or tending the young. More had been born on the journey, and he watched with awe as the whelps matured at incredible speed.

Reku turned her craggy head as he approached. She was losing her sight and was even more hunched over. When he compared her with the majestically built younger lamiae, it was almost pitiable to see her decline. Though she was no more likable. ‘Come to offer yourself as my last meal, boy? Roasted with garlic would be nice.’

‘I’ve brought some worms for your dinner,’ he snapped back, tired from the journey and irritable with loneliness. Though he was now their guide, only Kekropius would actually converse with him and it was wearing him down.

To his surprise she cackled gleefully. ‘Are they juicy fat ones, like human fingers? Drown them in wine, boy, then I’ll suck them down whole.’ She mimed a swallowing gesture and smacked her lips with a show of great pleasure.

‘Better yet, they are actual human fingers. See, I’ve cut off my fingers to feed you,’ he told her, joining in the game. He hid his hand in his sleeve and waved it at her.

‘Fingers,’ she purred. ‘I hope you didn’t fillet them, I love to crunch on the bones and suck out the marrow.’

Yeuck. That sounds too much like experience
. ‘Aunty Reku,’ he said, using the lamiae address form, ‘may I ask a question?’

She regarded him with a birdlike cocking of the head, a half-mad-looking one-eyed stare of appraisal. ‘Of course, child of Kessa.’ She made a teat-sucking sound, her eyes teasing.

He flushed; that memory still rankled. ‘Aunty, do any of your people have the ability to see things that are far away?’

Reku blinked several times and licked her lips: a sign of great interest. She leant towards him. ‘Some.’ She cocked her head. ‘We have the gnosis, and it answers our personalities, just like you magi. Some of us can wield fire and others can fly.’

Ha: thought so!
‘Might I be able to talk to one of those who can see far away?’

Reku turned her head and changed eyes. Her pupils were narrowing and dilating.
Appraisal
. ‘What for?’

‘To find someone.’

‘Will it put my people at risk?’

He hesitated. ‘Not if done properly,’ he answered honestly.

She exhaled thoughtfully.
Acceptance
. ‘Talk to Ildena, but only after her mate Fydro returns from hunting. Tell him I approve.’ She seized his left hand before he could react, then slowly drew it to her mouth.

‘Uh, what—?’

‘I have given you something – you owe me something in return.’ She opened her mouth and jerked forward, pinned his forefinger and bit down, drawing blood with her tiny pin-prick teeth. ‘Mmmm,’ she purred, rolling her eyes.

He didn’t move, perspiration beading on his brow as he tried to work out if this was a game or some kind of bargain sealer for securing her agreement. Her thick purple tongue coiled about each finger in turn, its surface both rough and slick. Then she pushed his hand away and roared with laughter. ‘Your face, boy, you should see it!’ She hunched over and wept, shaking with hilarity.

Eeeyeurgh
. He wiped his saliva-coated hand on his shirt, and hurried away.

*

The next night, as the lamiae awaited the returning scouts, he took Kekropius with him as his chaperone. Fydro was a burly lamia with a surly face. Kekropius did most of the talking, explaining that Fydro’s wife might be of great aid to the clan, but that she would need to learn from the human mage to enable this. Fydro was reluctant, as they were newly mated; Ildena was a delicate beauty and he was exceedingly possessive of her. Eventually he agreed, but only if he
was present. He appeared to regard Alaron as some kind of devil who would use his gnosis to seduce his wife. Alaron thought this bizarre. The lamiae were so alien he couldn’t even conceive of wanting to seduce one – even though in Lantric myths lamiae were sometimes lovers of this or that demigod or hero. He’d even stopped noticing breasts while with them; to the snake-people they were just another body part of no great importance, and he was so surrounded by personal body parts he’d practically stopped seeing them.

However, when he actually met Ildena for the first time, he began to understand Fydro’s feelings. Ildena’s face and human torso were lovely. She was small by lamia standards, slim and delicate, and her big golden eyes were shot through with seams of violet. Her hesitant, spooky smile was bewitching. Her narrow waist swayed as she entered the room, and her bosom was so high and shapely it kind of hooked his eyes.

Fydro draped a blanket about his wife’s shoulders and Kekropius shot Alaron a warning look.
Okay. I’m not even tempted.
He averted his eyes.
Not really.
‘Uh, can she speak Rondian?’ he asked. Not all the lamiae could.

‘I understand,’ Ildena replied, her voice deeper than he expected, with a musical lilt.

It took a lot of negotiation, every step contested by Fydro, who kept erupting into fits of anger, but eventually Alaron managed to get Ildena to sit opposite him – albeit with a table between them. He clasped her hands to channel a link and took her through the most basic lessons of Clairvoyance, although he’d never been much good at it himself. But he could do Mysticism, and that meant the mental link he forged was strong and efficient. He showed her how to seek the whereabouts of other lamiae. She had been using the gnosis since birth, and this new skill was really just a more systematic approach to something that had previously only manifested by accident. She found the scouts, swimming safely home, then she scryed their former haven, the Sanctum Lucator, and found it still undisturbed. He showed her how to make what she scryed appear in water or smoke, so that others could see what she saw. The night flew by and at the
end of it, they were both exhausted and exhilarated. She slumped, weeping with happiness, into her husband’s arms.

‘Enough,’ she sobbed, while Fydro stroked her shoulders and stared at Alaron with smouldering eyes.

He probably thinks I’ve corrupted her
. He rose and bowed formally. ‘Thank you,’ he managed, before lurching towards the door. Kekropius caught him, and the rest was a blur. He slept away the day, and they began again that night. This time they used Aggi, the little wooden doll Cym had once played with as a child, to search for her, but still they found no trace.

His life changed. Other lamiae came to him, wanting him to teach them the way he’d taught Ildena, and his training at Turm Zauberin meant he was able to help all of them, even those for whose skills he had no affinity. The lamiae had the potential for every aspect of the gnosis; they might be self-taught but they were instinctive users. He worked out they were all roughly quarter-blood in power, and eager to learn.

Between teaching them and scrying for Cym, he barely had time to sleep, but he found he actually began to enjoy his time with the lamiae.

Sometimes he even dreamt that he’d grown a snake body instead of legs.

*

‘Boron, welcome.’ Malevorn greeted the plump young priest, putting all the fondness he could muster into his voice. He offered his hand, but Funt staggered from the newly arrived windship and vomited on the grass instead. Most magi with any kind of air affinity were immune to flight-sickness, but Boron Funt was an exception –
probably because he eats constantly
, Malevorn thought. ‘A bad flight, my friend?’ In the two weeks since Adamus Crozier had sent out the summons for Funt, they’d made no progress at all in their hunt. The trail was going cold.

Boron looked up at him with green jowls and miserable eyes. ‘Mal? Thank Kore!’ He lurched upright, and seized him in a giant bear-hug. ‘Ghastly, simply ghastly.’ Then he looked around, and realised that
he’d stumbled right past a Crozier and an Inquisition Commandant. His face went from green to white. ‘My lords!’ He fell to his knees and prostrated himself.

‘Rise, young priest,’ Adamus said with a smirk. ‘We are all brothers in Kore here.’

The windship had landed on the lawn before the villa the Fist had commandeered. Malevorn made the introductions, cringing somewhat to be associated with this buffoon. The Inquisitors looked upon Boron with utter contempt, and he completely agreed with them; it did his own standing no good at all to be associated in any way with this rolling piece of blubber. But he was appointed Funt’s guide and told to room with him. Unless Funt had been miraculously cured of snoring and flatulence, the coming nights promised to be Hel.

Vordan and Adamus took Malevorn and Funt off to brief Funt on who he was to seek.

‘Alaron Mercer?’ Funt laughed uncertainly. ‘Is this some kind of jest?’

‘No joke, Boron,’ Malevorn told him with utter sincerity.
fucking
serious.>

Funt straightened. ‘I remember Mercer,’ he told Adamus and Vordan. ‘Do you wish me to start now?’

‘As soon as you’re settled,’ Vordan told him. ‘He must not detect your scrying. He has eluded us thus far, so I suspect he may be more skilled than you credit him. Of course, he may be dead, but I think not. So proceed with caution. Am I understood?’ His iron gaze transfixed the plump young priest.

‘Absolutely, perfectly, completely!’ Boron blathered. ‘You can rely on me, Commandant.’

‘Excellent. Then proceed.’

When they were alone in their suite, Boron plucked at Malevorn’s shoulder. ‘
Kore’s codpiece! Alaron Mercer?
’

‘The same.’

Boron’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s going on? Your Fist was pulled from the Crusade for this. I heard gossip that Governor Vult is dead.
Gron Koll too,’ he added, unable to resist a smirk. ‘What’s happening?’

Malevorn considered. Boron might be a glutton and a coward, but he had always had a nose for secrets. ‘I don’t know, my friend,’ he lied. ‘But I’m sure you’ll sniff it out.’

Boron laughed, his first sign of genuine pleasure. ‘Oh, I shall, Mal. You can’t keep a good plot from me.’

*

‘Cym? Cym?’ Alaron shouted, heedless of danger, but no one replied. The empty island mocked him, echoing his cries back as if teasing him. He looked about him wildly, but no one answered. He bent over the wreckage, gripping it with shaking hands, and fought to hold back his tears.

Ildena touched his shoulder tentatively, which made the watching Fydro hiss. ‘Alaron?’ the lamia asked softly. ‘This was hers?’ She was wrapped in a blanket, at Fydro’s insistence, despite the heat of the sun.

The lamiae had taken his advice to travel to Phaestos to shorten the journey, though for Alaron it meant swimming under a water-breathing spell again, clinging to Kekropius’ back for dear life as they fought the deadly waters. But the lamiae were strong swimmers, and he managed.

They’d made their base in the ruins of the mining town, a ghostly place that looked like the aftermath of a young god’s temper tantrum. The peaks of the triple volcanoes at the core of the island smoked menacingly. The vegetation was stunted and there were no animals, only birds by the thousand, though the seas were alive with seals, thriving in the warm waters.

They’d found the wreckage of Cym’s skiff on a rocky plain.

‘She and I built it,’ Alaron said hoarsely. It had been such a wonderful time, just the two of them alone, working together in harmony. Of course, he’d been in constant torment from his longing to kiss her, but apart from that, it had been bliss.

‘Is it repairable?’ Kekropius asked, slithering about the broken hull.

Alaron’s first impulse was to scoff, but he made himself look more
closely. ‘The keel is cracked, and so is the mast – look, she’s tried to repair it, but couldn’t. She’s probably better at sylvan-gnosis than me, but neither Ramon or I knew enough to teach her.’

‘Some of our people can perform these feats,’ Kekropius mused aloud. ‘We could rebuild this for you.’

‘Would you be willing?’

‘You are leading us to Hebusalim, the Promised Land,’ Kekropius replied. ‘We will do anything for you.’

Apart from letting me go off alone
, Alaron noted to himself, and immediately felt ashamed. The lamiae had saved his life; to criticise their protectiveness was unworthy.