The Curse on the Chosen (The Song of the Tears Book 2) (2 page)

‘No,’ Maelys said faintly.

His cheek went purple. ‘If he’s not lying, you must be.’

‘I’m not lying,’ she gasped. This was much harder than she’d
thought; she couldn’t do it.

Jal-Nish turned to Nish. Say nothing, Nish, Maelys prayed.
Leave it to me.

‘Well, Cryl-Nish?’ said his father.

‘I have not had relations with her. As far as I know, Maelys
is a virgin.’ Nish’s jaw clenched and his eyes flicked towards Colm.

No, Maelys prayed. Please don’t say it, Nish. You’ll ruin
everything. If you ever cared about me at all, please keep quiet.

He said thickly, ‘Though
he
may have taken her on the way here – they were close enough when they
arrived.’

Out of the corner of her eye Maelys saw Colm’s look of
outrage. ‘I may be just a humble woodcutter to you, Deliverer, but I’ve behaved
as a gentleman with Maelys, as I have with all women. While you,
surr
, are nothing but scum, no matter
who your father is.’

Jal-Nish’s fingers stroked Reaper, hooked through its
silvery surface and Colm doubled over, gasping for air.

‘Despite his manifest failings,’ he grated, ‘Cryl-Nish is my
only son, and the chosen one. You will treat him with the respect due to his
station.’

Colm collapsed, clawing at the dead moss covering the floor.
Jal-Nish looked away indifferently and spoke to Maelys. ‘Virginity is easily
tested, girl. Think carefully before you say any more, for every untrue word
earns you a deeper excruciation.’

Maelys
had
thought
very carefully, but the story was already spinning out of her control. Besides,
she had always been a modest girl, and in her family people did not talk about
such matters, especially not to strangers; but there was no going back now.

‘You may have me tested,’ she said, flushing at the thought
of it, even at speaking of such an intimate test, ‘and you will discover that I
am a virgin still. Colm does not lie.
He
is a gentleman.’

‘Then you’re a lying slut,’ spat Jal-Nish. ‘You’ve proven it
out of your own mouth.’

The sky palace loomed into view, its white stone sails
shining in a fleeting ray of sunlight. He stopped it with a backwards gesture.

‘I’m neither a liar nor a slut.’ Maelys felt her cheeks
going even redder. ‘I
am
pregnant, to
Nish.’

‘Why do you insist on this vicious falsehood?’ Jal-Nish’s
flesh-formed hand gripped a rock at the entrance, crushing it to dust. ‘Faugh!
I’ve had enough of this.’ He turned to step out onto the plank and Maelys could
not think how to stop him.

‘There is – a way,’ Flydd said hoarsely from the
floor. ‘We both know – it can be done, Jal-Nish.’

Jal-Nish spun on his boot heel on the swaying plank, strode
back to Maelys and lifted her by the front of her shirt, staring into her eyes.
She forced herself to meet his one eye, and again she saw that fleeting spark
of hope in it.

‘Well, girl?’ he said, letting her down again. ‘I have to
know. And you must understand that, once I have Gatherer in my hands again, I
can sort truth from falsehood in an instant.’

Yet you want this grandchild so desperately you can’t bear
to wait until the sky palace arrives. It was his weakness and her opportunity,
though only if she could capitalise on it once she’d told her story, and Maelys
still hadn’t thought of a way to do that.

‘Your son is a passionate man,’ she said, ‘a lusty man who
had been deprived for ten years.’

‘I know my son,’ he said thickly. ‘I was like that myself,
before the tears raised me above such animal appetites. Get on with it.’

The cavern was perfectly still; there was no sound apart
from the swishing of the moss curtain in the wind and the creaking of the
monstrous mooring cables as the sky palace moved in the updraughts.

‘I nursed Nish after he was wounded leading the Defiance in
their victory over your army,’ said Maelys. So far, so good, but she hadn’t
begun the real lie yet. Her eyes met Nish’s, and it looked as though he was
trying to say something, but she couldn’t tell what.

‘It was no victory at all,’ sneered Jal-Nish. ‘I was
directing my troops via Gatherer. I let him win.’

No difficulty reading Nish’s face now. He was a man stripped
naked to the world, his anguish showing in the shards of his cheekbones, the
fingers like fishhooks; the raw, running eyes.

Maelys felt acid rising up into her throat, burning her.
Jal-Nish was an even bigger monster than she’d thought. ‘You deliberately sent
thousands of men to their deaths, and left the rest of your own army dying in
agony in that slaughter heap? Why?’

Jal-Nish chuckled. ‘It amused me to let the so-called
Defiance think they could win, for it will make their ultimate defeat all the
more crushing. How did you do it, girl?’

Maelys could barely breathe. She couldn’t speak for a
moment, but she had to master herself. The soldiers were long dead; she had to
take care of the living.

‘Nish …’ It was so difficult to say it; she felt a scarlet
blush spreading up her neck and across her cheeks. ‘Your – your son is
such a lusty man that, even while recovering from that terrible arrow wound, he
was … subject to an, er, nocturnal, um, flux.’

‘Nocturnal
flux
?’
Jal-Nish cried. ‘Speak in a plain tongue, girl, and be swift about it, or
Reaper will sear it out of your living mouth.’

‘Even in the most terrible fever, and half dead, Nish became
so aroused each night that he spilled his seed upon the sheets.’ Her cheeks
were so inflamed that they stung. ‘I had to have him, any way I could, but Nish
would not have me at any price.’

‘I’m not surprised. My son is entitled to princesses; he
could see nothing in such a plain little minx as you.’

Maelys was used to insults, she’d had a lifetime of them
from her mother and aunts, yet she winced. ‘And so,’ she went on haltingly, ‘on
the second night of nursing him, while Nish groaned in his lusty delirium, I
gathered up his seed and inserted it within myself, and now I’m pregnant by
him. And still a virgin; it can only be his child.’

There was a shattering silence. Maelys lowered her head,
trying to see Nish out of the corner of her eye, but he had turned away. Not
Colm, though. He was staring at her in appalled, contemptuous disgust. He was
not a forgiving man: in his eyes their time together, and their friendship, had
been a lie and a stain on his own honour. No matter what happened next, he
would never forgive her.

‘The chances of becoming pregnant –’ began Jal-Nish.

‘My clan are
very
fertile,’ she said truthfully. ‘And it was the right time of the month.’

‘Well, Son?’ said Jal-Nish. ‘What do you have to say?’

Nish wore a faint smile. He was not displeased to be
described as a lusty man. Boor, she thought. Oaf! Yet he met her eye and,
surprisingly, she saw no censure there – indeed, a trace of admiration
that she’d been game to take his father on. Despite his flaws, Nish possessed qualities
that Colm would never have.

‘I am, as we discussed earlier, a man of strong appetites,’
Nish said. ‘What Maelys says could be true. I lay in a fever for days, so how
would I know what she got up to?’

Jal-Nish turned back to her. ‘Why?’ he said simply.

She’d scraped over the first hurdle but Maelys couldn’t
relax yet. Now was time for the plain truth. ‘Ever since I was a little girl,
and first heard the tale of Nish’s heroism and nobility in the lyrinx wars,
I’ve looked up to him. I admired …
admire
him above all men.’

‘So you had to have him, any sordid way you could, to
further your absurd fantasy.’ His lip curled.

‘I did not,’ she said with dignity, ‘for I knew Nish was far
above me and out of reach. I come from a good family, yet I’m a simple country
girl and the ways and doings of the mighty are beyond me.’

‘Indeed they are!’ said Jal-Nish. ‘I would not have chosen
you
for my son; not for anything. Then
why?’

‘My mother and aunts knew how I admired Nish and required me
to commit this dreadful wickedness, for it was the only way to save our clan
– Clan Nifferlin.’

‘Clan Nifferlin,’ Jal-Nish said thoughtfully. ‘An old clan,
once troublesome, but no more. All resistance failed with the death of the last
male – your father, Rudigo – a week ago.’

That shook her, though her beloved father had been on the
run since she was twelve, and had been captured long ago. She’d been expecting
his death for a year, but even so, tears welled in her eyes.

‘Father is dead? Please, did he suffer at the end?’

‘Oh, I made him suffer,’ said Jal-Nish with vengeful relish.
‘Once I discovered your role in Cryl-Nish’s escape, I kept Rudigo alive so he
could suffer all the more.’

Maelys lowered her head. She couldn’t speak; could not bear
to think of her father in torment because of what her mother and aunts had
forced her to do.

‘Your aunts put you up to this,’ Jal-Nish said, ‘and somehow
you,
a simple country girl
, succeeded
against all the odds. You have saved your family, for the moment at least, for
until proven otherwise your clan is bound to mine with indissoluble ties of
blood. There’s more to you than meets the eye, girl. Perhaps you aren’t such a
bad choice after all –
if you’re
telling the truth
. But I’ll soon discover that, and if you have been
truthful, you will have everything you’ve ever dreamed of.’ He studied her,
then Nish, then Maelys again. ‘And if you’ve lied – well, I’ll leave that
to your
fertile
imagination.’

Maelys couldn’t relax, for she’d merely won her family a
tiny reprieve. It could be as little as an hour, once he took her onto the sky
palace and tested her with Gatherer, or as much as a few weeks if she held out,
and Jal-Nish had to wait until she had her next monthly courses. But the moment
she did, Maelys would be revealed as a liar and a cheat, and both she and her
family would be doomed. Claiming that she’d miscarried would not save her. Only
Nish’s child could.

Unless she could get away before he tested her. That was the
second impossibility, though having achieved the first, however fleetingly, she
felt bolder now.

Jal-Nish beckoned the sky palace forwards, impatient to get
moving, but there came a terrific crack from below the cave. Gigantic lumps of
rock flew in all directions and the mooring cable tore free and hurtled
upwards, smashing the gangplank to metal splinters.

Jal-Nish teetered on the rim of the entrance as the cable
flailed across the sky like a writhing worm, the massive anchor clanking on its
end. The sky palace tilted and the tension of the remaining cables jerked it up
out of sight. He cursed, then began shouting orders to his helmsman, via
Reaper.

Maelys met Colm’s eyes. He gave her a look of deepest
contempt and turned away, and she knew she’d lost a friend forever. It hurt,
but she put it to one side. Clan first –
always
clan first.

‘Xervish,’ she said softly. ‘Try the crystal again. This is
the only chance we’ll get.’

He was on his feet now, holding the diamond-clear,
thumbnail-sized crystal out on his shaking palm and staring at the fire burning
within it – the power it had absorbed from the cursed flame below the
obelisk standing in the centre of the marshy plateau. Flame reflected in his
brown eyes. ‘Can’t,’ Flydd said dully. ‘Nothing left.’

‘You’ve got to find it again. You’ve got to remember.’

‘Art is gone. Body – renewed, but Art – didn’t
survive. Lost them. Hollowed out; empty; useless.’

Maelys had never heard such bitterness from Flydd before;
and without his Arts, how could they hope to escape through the shadow realm to
safety? It was a dangerous place where they needed all the protection they
could get, and he had long ago woven such protections into his crystals,
especially the fifth, the only one left. But no matter how dangerous the shadow
realm might be, they had to go through it, for Jal-Nish had covered every other
escape route.

‘Xervish,’ said Nish uneasily, ‘please try again. Open the
hidden door and get us out of here.’

‘Arts – lost!’ Flydd said through his teeth. ‘She
– must have taken them.’

‘Who? Maelys?’ Nish’s eyes probed her.

‘No!’ Flydd gasped, retching again. ‘Woman – in red.’

‘What woman in red?’ said Nish quietly, with an anxious look
at his father’s back.

‘Was in my mind – during renewal. Thought she
was
me.’

‘That doesn’t make sense, Xervish.’

Flydd looked up blankly. ‘Don’t know. Memory in pieces.’

‘It’ll come back. You recognised us, so you’ve still got
some memories.
Use them!
’

‘Can’t.’ Flydd began to retch, spitting bloody muck onto the
floor.

‘The crystal is charged,’ said Maelys, staring at it, though
without Flydd’s Art it was as useless as a lump of coal. ‘Jal-Nish said it has
power to open any barrier. Tell us how, Xervish. Hurry!’ If renewal had gone
wrong, internally, Flydd might be dying. All the more reason for her to act
quickly.

Jal-Nish stepped inside. He’d overheard. ‘
For one who can use it
, I said. None of
you can, no matter how you try. But try, by all means.’ He smiled maliciously,
then turned away and plunged his hand into Reaper again. The sky palace
reappeared, listing steeply to starboard in the fierce updraught, and objects
began to slide off its decks. Maelys felt her slim hope fading. With Reaper he
would soon set the sky palace to rights. What could the God-Emperor not do with
the tears?

However the sky palace listed further and Jal-Nish cursed.
‘Pathway!’

With a metallic
zing
,
a copper-coloured plank fizzed into existence between the cavern and the sky
palace. Withdrawing his hand from Reaper, he began to stride up the plank.
Coloured pressure patterns swirled across its coppery surface with every step,
and it shortened behind him so that he was always walking upon its quivering
outer end. Without turning, he thrust his arm backwards and a brown wall formed
at the cavern entrance, then slowly solidified like baked clay until the light
was blocked out. They were trapped.