The Devoured Earth (39 page)

She nodded and sat next to him, taking the weight off her lame leg. The pins and needles had faded to a dull throb.

‘Still,’ she said, ‘I’m impressed. She had to practically knock me out to get me in line.’ She rubbed the back of her head where a tender bump had formed. ‘Punched by a Goddess. Not many people can claim that.’

He smiled and Shilly thought that for every new wrinkle his smile created, at least five stress-related lines vanished.

‘You should do that more often,’ she told him.

‘When this is over, perhaps I will,’ he said. The smile slipped away. ‘I’ve called the Alcaide and asked for help. To be frank, I don’t think he believed half of what I told him.’

‘It does sound a little unlikely.’ Glasts, goddesses, and golems were just the tip of a preposterous iceberg. ‘What help were you looking for?’

‘I’m not sure exactly. Advice, at the very least. He said he would consult with the Conclave and get back to me. Somehow, I don’t think that’s going to happen quickly enough.’

‘Somehow, I think you’re right. And that’s not the worst of it.’ Shilly decided then, on instinct, to share with him the broad details of her conversation with Sal. ‘We’re caught between two competing factions. The seers want to separate the realms and destroy the Flame so that there’s no chance of creating a new world-tree infected with Yod. Pukje’s side wants the realms reunited so the old gods can come back and help us kick Yod’s arse. I’m not sure I like either option, but I’ve yet to think of a third one. Until we do, we’re going to stay stuck.’

‘But we have to decide soon.’ Marmion nodded. ‘And I don’t feel particularly qualified to make that decision.’

‘Would you defer to her,’ Shilly asked, nodding at the recumbent Goddess, ‘if you had to?’

‘If I had to, of course.’ He sighed. ‘Just like you did with Vehofnehu. I honestly don’t blame you for running off with him. I don’t even blame him for stranding us up here. Sometimes it’s best not to wonder what will happen
after
.’ There was a wealth of expression in his simple shrug.

She nodded, thinking of her future self and what might have been had Sal died in the tunnel. She had been rescued from that fate by the glast but exposed to all manner of uncertainties now. What did it mean that the future-Shilly hadn’t known what the glast was? Where would that particular detail lead her?

Such thoughts reminded her of her dream of the Holy Immortals. It had been a relief to ponder something else, for a change, during her sleep. A different situation, but a similar kind of grief…

‘I have a horrible feeling,’ she said, ‘that, whatever happens, not all of us will be going home.’

He surprised her by reaching out and taking her right hand. ‘Whatever happens, as you put it, you have my word that your sentence will be lifted. You and Sal will be free to live as you please, anywhere in the Strand. I don’t care what it takes or whose arm I have to twist. I don’t care if I have to come back from the dead and haunt someone until they make the right decision. You’ve earned that right, and I will ensure it happens.’

Shilly surprised herself in turn. ‘Well, you’ll always be welcome in Fundelry, should you ever want to visit. Sal and I will show you the sights, what few there are. We can talk about old times.’ She blinked back an unexpected sorrow. ‘I can’t promise to bake a cake, but —’

She stopped suddenly, realising exactly how Marmion was holding her hand. She could feel his fingers around hers, warm and comforting and definitely ten in number. Yet there were only five visible. His left arm ended in a puckered stump that had yet to completely heal.

‘It’s still there?’ she asked in a whisper, fighting the urge to pull away in revulsion.

He nodded. ‘It’s going to make a wonderful party trick when I get home.’

The thought of Marmion going to a party was as shocking as the revelation that he still had a piece of the Swarm inside him. ‘Why have you kept it a secret?’

‘Only you and Kail know. I don’t want to frighten or worry people. But I’ve been thinking about what the Goddess said. If we’re all here for a reason, then maybe
everything’s
happened for a reason.’

‘Like losing your hand?’

‘And gaining a new one.’

‘Is that a comfort?’

‘Which? The new hand or the knowledge that it might be needed?’

Her head was beginning to hurt. ‘I don’t know. Both.’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘to both.’

‘Well, that’s something.’ She pulled her hand away, not able to maintain that eerie contact any longer. The ghost hand he had stolen from the Swarm felt as solid as a real one. It was even warm to the touch. ‘Can you —’ She faltered, then ploughed on. ‘Can you reach through walls or into closed boxes with it?’

‘No. Although I’ve tried, when no one was looking. It works the same way as an ordinary hand.’

‘It’s hard to see how it could be useful then.’

‘It’s already come in handy once,’ he said. ‘It stopped a lightning bolt from killing me. And I’ll never have to worry about frostbite — or burns for that matter.’

‘The indestructible hand.’ She found a glimmer of humour in the situation, then. ‘You sound like one of those old legends. You know: Spider-Man, the Silver Surfer and all that. Perhaps you should get a fancy outfit too.’

He smiled. ‘Perhaps I will.’

A rattle of stone distracted both of them. Shilly turned in time to see a shower of dust fall in a curtain from a point high above. Marmion was on his feet in an instant, snapping his fingers to bring the crystals to full brightness. In the suddenly blinding light, Shilly saw a strange, bone-white shape scuttle into a hole in the ceiling.

‘Ware!’ the warden cried to the sleepers and those on guard. To the shape in the ceiling he called, ‘Who goes there?’

There came no response, and Shilly saw no repeat of the movement. Neither she nor Marmion raised the possibility that they might have imagined it.

Concerned people began to gather around them, in various stages of alertness.

‘What’s going on?’ asked Lidia Delfine. ‘Have we been found?’

‘Safest to assume so,’ said Marmion. ‘Either way, we’re moving. Pack enough food for one day. Leave the bedrolls. Rosevear, bring everything you have. Spread the load. Assign stretcher bearers for Tom. We’re not leaving him behind. Quickly, everyone! Move!’

The gathering dispersed and went hurriedly about their tasks, moving as rapidly as fatigue and surprise allowed. A call too high-pitched for a human throat echoed through the cavern, setting the hair on Shilly’s neck upright, and encouraging people to move faster. She eyed each indentation in the ceiling with nervous attention, ready for anything at all to burst into view.

Sal had their packs half-full by the time she hobbled over. She stuffed her notes and sketches into hers even though the paper was heavy and she would be hard-pressed to keep up as it was. It had to be useful for
something
.

Another cry went up, then a third from the far side of the cavern. All eyes turned to the ceiling in wary expectation. Something moved in the corner of her eye, but it was only the twins, clinging to the cavern’s rough walls with all their extra limbs and artificial strength. The overlapping heads turned, seeking the source of the sound. As they moved crablike from handhold to handhold, she held her breath, almost afraid to know what they might find.

A white shape dropped out of a crack near the wounded, unfolding as it fell. Shilly had a fleeting glimpse of something very much like a human skeleton with black eyes and grinning teeth and limbs like sticks before it vanished behind Lidia Delfine and Heuve. Their swords flashed in the crystal-light. The alien cry sounded again, in defiance and pain. Three more shapes followed in three different places, and Shilly raised her stick in readiness to fight.

* * * *

THE DEVELS

‘Bravery is not the opposite of cowardice.

Bravery cannot exist without cowardice.

A warrior who fights with certainty on her side

has already fallen.’

THE BOOK OF TOWERS
, EXEGESIS 4:13

adrian could sense the wrongness in the air. He could feel it in the skin of the Homunculus; he could practically
taste
it in his mouth. As he and Seth climbed the wall and then the ceiling of the cavern, seeking the source of the wrongness, he thought about nothing else.
Don’t worry about what comes next,
he told himself.
That’s a responsibility you don’t want. Concentrate on what’s happening right now instead.

Even so, part of him was still sitting on the floor of the cavern, listening as Ellis counted off the points of her plan, one by terrible one.

‘First, we go back down the tunnel to the Tomb. All of us. No one gets out alive this time if things don’t go right.’

Something as pale as a maggot and as gangly as a Halloween skeleton dropped out of a hole in the ceiling, too far from the twins for them to intercept. Hadrian tensed to jump, even though the foresters were already dealing with the attacker, when three more dropped from elsewhere in the ceiling. One landed almost directly under them.

‘Devels!’ Pukje cried.

With a cry of anger, the twins kicked off the ceiling and dropped onto the creature below them. It had snatched at Warden Banner with long white claws and was preparing to bite her throat. Four fists converged on a point inside the devel’s skull. With a horrible cracking sound, its head burst open, spraying them and Banner with pink and black flesh.

‘Second, I set the Flame burning again. I know that’s dangerous, because if it gets into Yod’s hands that’s the end of everything, but if I don’t do it then you’ll have to die. Both of you. And I don’t want that any more than you do.’

Hadrian swallowed nausea as he and his brother let the twitching body drop to the ground. He could hear Ellis shouting over the racket and they forced their way to her side. Flashes of the Change thrilled through them, making their artificial body tingle. Fleeting forms flashed in and out of existence, moulded by Change-users from air, light, mist, anything available, cutting, slicing or clubbing the devels as they moved in.

More of the white shapes dropped from the ceiling, targeting the weak and the defenceless. The strong fought back, filling the air with cries of triumph and pain. The Angel stamped at the devels that tried to mount it. Pink blood mingled with red. A devel jumped on the twins from behind. They brought their gore-slicked hands around and threw it into the cave wall.

It occurred to Hadrian that for the first time everyone was fighting on the same side. There was no squabbling or bickering about who had the right to lead or whose needs took precedence. Warden, Mage, forester, Panic, Ice Eater and man’kin all worked together to repel the devels.

The only ones standing apart were the glast, riding high on the Angel’s sturdy back, and Pukje, who had taken a perch on the glast’s broad right shoulder. Both watched the scene from their elevated, dispassionate perspectives and kept their own counsel.

‘Third, Highson Sparre frees you from the Homunculus. He created the damned thing; he can do that if anyone can.’

Devel after devel fell in brutal defeat. Barely had Hadrian begun to wonder at the point of it all when a new cry went up.

‘THE DOOR!’ Kelloman’s voice came clearly over the sounds of battle, amplified by the stone walls of the cavern. ‘THE DOOR IS OPENING!’

Hadrian and Seth craned their heads to see. Sure enough, the stones were shifting where Kelloman and Marmion had so carefully laid them back into place. A baleful orange light filtered through the cracks.

‘Gabra’il!’ Seth hissed.

‘None other,’ said Ellis, sidling closer to them and clubbing at a devel with the blunt end of a hook Griel had tossed her. ‘Watch Sal. This is his moment.’

Hadrian reached out with both hands and stopped the devel’s heart. Then he did as Ellis had suggested and found the young wild talent walking forward through the crowd, hands held wide above his head.

‘Fourth, we lure Yod into a trap. That means stepping outside the glast’s protection, and that will be very dangerous. Mage Kelloman will be crucial here, since he’s least vulnerable.’

With a deafening crash, the wall burst asunder. The fiery orange giant that had been Yod’s chief minister in the Second Realm stepped easily over the rubble. His armour glowed like molten metal poured over coals, fading to black at the joints and throat. The edge of his tapering crystal sword sparkled fitfully along its length, as though slicing atoms apart as it moved through the air. He towered over Sal, who had stopped directly in front of the giant. Gabra’il’s head almost brushed the ceiling as he looked down at the young man in front of him. The sword, hissing, swept back and then forward with awful, unstoppable momentum to slice Sal in two.

‘No,’ said Sal.

The sword stopped.

‘Fifth, we spring the trap. Marmion and the others should have the strength to pull this off. If they don’t, well, we’re all screwed.’

The sword stopped, and shattered into hundreds of dagger-sharp fragments. Gabra’il staggered, taken off-balance by the blocking of the blow. His face was barely visible behind his orange helm, but Hadrian could feel the shock radiating from him. It might have been a very long time since someone had successfully stood up to him.

Sal looked a little surprised too, but not for long. As Gabra’il straightened and hooked his giant fingers into claws — each one as long as a sword — and lunged at his much tinier opponent. Sal ducked and pressed his hand against the ground. The Change-flows Hadrian had detected before were nothing to those that swept through the room then. He felt as though a psychic plug had been pulled, exposing a very deep well leading into the earth. Strange energies tugged at him, at every living thing in the cavern, and made the air vibrate.

Gabra’il went to snatch at Sal again, but missed and flailed uselessly in mid-air. Not because Sal had moved, but because the ground had shifted beneath him. The stone turned to dust that parted with a slithery hissing noise, sucking him down to his knees. The giant roared in anger, but there was nothing it could do against gravity and the suddenly infirm floor.