The Fate of the Fallen (The Song of the Tears Book 1) (71 page)

‘Good idea,’ said Nish. They went out towards the main
cleft, keeping close to the rim where the turbulence was greatest.

Something flashed in the thunderhead. It wasn’t lightning,
but white light focussed to a pinpoint, followed by a rolling echo that sounded
as if there were words in it, harsh orders. Nish couldn’t make them out.

There came an almighty ground-shaking thump, as if something
massive had fallen a long way away. Blue light jagged down from the clouds
towards the centre of the plateau, followed by a long, echoing boom. Nish
couldn’t see anything out there, though.

The leading rider hauled his beast in their direction. Had
the flappeter seen him? Nish couldn’t be sure – the red amber-wood was
supposed to conceal them, but if they’d seen through it his father must be
close by, wielding Gatherer. The flappeter fought its rider for a minute or
two, until he raised a stubby rod in his right hand and pressed it to the nub
at the back of the beast’s skull.

It jerked convulsively, the feather-rotors missing a beat
and its back arching up until its tail almost touched the back of its head.
Curving around in a great circle which took it a league out over the
rainforest, it turned and raced towards them.

Nish wearily raised his sword, though nothing save an
exceptionally long and well-aimed spear would be any good against a racing
flappeter. The beast hurtled towards them, its feather-rotors a blur, clearly
planning to use its momentum to cleave straight through the turbulence.

‘Leave this one to me, surr,’ said Zham, pushing Nish out of
the way.

He sprang forwards towards the edge of the cliff, his great
sword held out and up. He looked as solid as one of the giant trees in the
rainforest below, though next to a flappeter even Zham was small, and it was
coming so fast that it would smash right through him, or drive his shattered
body through the low rocks behind them.

Zham crouched abruptly. What was he up to?

Nish suddenly realised that it wasn’t attacking at all. It
was coming straight for
him
, as the
first one had, that night in the Defiance camp before the battle. Its intention
must be to snatch him, then fly inland and climb through the air over the
marshes, which Jal-Nish was now calming with his weather Arts.

As Nish stumbled backwards, Zham sprang up into the path of
the flappeter. It saw him just as it entered the zone of the updraught. It
baulked instinctively at the obstacle, reared up but lost way and was caught
side-on in the boiling wind. The flappeter was flung upside down, then stopped
dead in the air. The rotor shaft appeared to lock under the strain but the
feather-rotors kept spinning until they twisted the shaft right out of the
creature’s back in a sticky spray of scales, flesh and horny carapace. The
rider, screaming in sympathetic agony, tried to leap to safety but couldn’t get
free of the saddle in time. The flappeter crashed upside down onto the edge of
the cliff, stoving the rider’s head in and breaking its own back, then lay
there, kicking and screeching, until Zham darted across and severed its head
from its body.

‘Well done, Zham,’ Nish said, putting a hand on the big
man’s shoulder. ‘I never would have thought of that.’

‘I always try to think of a way to avoid fighting, first.’

After that, not even the most furious flashes and thundering
orders from above could induce the other flappeters to approach. Jal-Nish’s
flesh-formed creatures were ingenious and deadly, but that wasn’t enough to
overcome the plateau’s natural defences. Flydd had chosen his lair well.

‘Is that it?’ Zham said hopefully as the remaining flappeters
curved away towards the forest. ‘Have we beaten him?’

‘Never. He’ll wait, and in an hour or two his troops will be
able to pass our burning barriers …’

‘What are you thinking, Nish?’

‘That he’ll beat us if we give him time. We’ve got to force
Father’s hand and make him attack now, before he’s ready. Before his troops can
get here.’

‘How will that help?’

‘Maybe it won’t, but it can’t make things worse. Keep watch.
This is our final hour – it’s all or nothing now.’ He shook his fist at
the black sky, shouting, ‘
I defy you
,
Father, and I’ll win, for you don’t have the courage to face me.’

A growl of thunder made the cloud swirl. Nish shivered then
went into the hut.

Flydd – it was almost impossible to think of him as
Flydd, because he looked so different – was sitting up now, holding a
wooden mug of water to his lips. His hands barely had the strength to keep it
there.

‘Surr!’ said Nish. ‘Your renewal worked!’

‘Did it?’ croaked Flydd. ‘I don’t – know.’

‘Of course it did,’ Nish said uneasily. ‘Surr, that wasn’t
Vomix we saw before, it was Monkshart, under an illusion …’ He trailed off,
looking around the dark hut. ‘Where’s Maelys?’

‘Sent – her out.’

‘You what?’

‘Renewal – took four – crystals.’ Flydd could
barely get the words out. ‘Had to have – more power.’

‘When, Xervish?

‘After flash and boom. Had – idea. Sent her –
obelisk – charge crystal – flame.’

A chill made its way up Nish’s spine. ‘But that was
Monkshart on the flappeter, earlier, not Vomix. So the other rider must have
been …’

‘Phrune,’ Flydd gasped.

Maelys’s nemesis, and she didn’t know he was there.

 
FORTY-NINE

Maelys had been moistening Flydd’s mouth with water,
careful not to let him swallow any since his renewed stomach would not be able
to take it yet, when the plateau shook. A blue flash came through the doorway,
followed by a distant, echoing boom.

‘What – that?’ croaked Flydd.

She went to the door. ‘I can’t see anything save Nish and
Zham over by the rim, halfway to the main cleft. They’re staring up at a flight
of flappeters – looks as though they’re going to attack. I can’t see
Colm.’

‘Boom?’ said Flydd. ‘Obelisk?’

‘What? Oh, I don’t know where the sound came from, though I
can see a blue flicker out in the mire. I can’t make out the obelisk, but the
flicker comes from that direction. What is it, Xervish?’

‘Take – last crystal.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘To cursed – flame. Obelisk.’

‘But … you said no one can get to the power contained
beneath the obelisk.’

‘Jal-Nish – destroy – so can – can –
come down. Chance. Take crystal. Go. Go!’

Maelys’s mouth went dry. ‘I don’t know what you want me to
do. What is the cursed flame? Is it safe to go near it?’

‘Charge crystal – flame. Only chance. Go …’ His head
slumped forwards and his eyes closed.

Maelys felt dreadfully afraid. She didn’t know enough
– no, she didn’t know
anything
save that the obelisk was deadly and the flame cursed. How was she to charge
the last crystal?

She would have seized upon any excuse to remain here, but
she’d pressured Flydd to take renewal against his sworn oath, so how could she
back out now?

Maelys got the crystal out of the box – it was the
size of her thumbnail and perfectly clear, like diamond, though it had no
sparkle – put it in a secure pocket and turned to Flydd. ‘I’m off, then.’

His head was still slumped; he looked asleep or unconscious,
but he wheezed, ‘Take – amber-wood coat. All rests – on you.
Hurry!’

Hanging on a hook behind the door was a long coat made from
thousands of little shaped pieces of amber-wood threaded on knotted cords. The
pieces made up an intricate, swirling design which she couldn’t identify in the
dim light. The detailed work would have helped Flydd pass the endless, solitary
hours, though perhaps the design had a purpose, too.

The coat came down to her heels and had a hood as well. She
put it on and fastened the amber-wood toggles. It was light but warm, and the
fragrance released by the wood was overpowering. As soon as she’d fastened the
last toggle she felt an amazing sense of security – as if she’d just been
removed from the physical world. The coat was greater than the sum of its
parts. But would it hide her from the direct gaze of Gatherer?

She took a lantern, though Maelys did not light it, and ran
out. On the rim, Nish and Zham had their swords up and a flappeter was heading
in towards them. Maelys froze, one foot in the air, but there was no time to
make sure they were safe. She grabbed her staff and scuttled into the mire
towards the obelisk.

She hoped she’d meet Colm on the way – she’d feel so
much safer looking for the cursed flame with him – but there was no sign
of him. What if he’d been caught; killed?

She had no trouble finding the obelisk this time, for its
covering of grey lichen shone silvery in the faint light of the luminal, and
she could hear the wind howling around it. She even found a way to get to the
obelisk without plunging up to her nose in a dark pool. The stone looked as
though it had been struck by a bolt of lightning. Half of the moss and lichen
had been charred off and it was tilted at an angle of fifty degrees. At the
point where its base had been bonded to the living rock she found a neat,
triangular hole, not much wider than her shoulders, from which a stream of
warm, musty air issued.

Only now did she remember the second rider – the one
who had dropped from Vomix’s flappeter and headed into the mires. Had he been
coming to the obelisk? She had seen no footmarks in the moonlight, though
walking in this country rarely left good tracks. Even moss soon sprang back up
to obliterate them.

She checked all around but saw no sign of him. Nonetheless,
she wasn’t going to be taken unawares. Crouching low, Maelys lit the lantern,
unshuttered it a fraction and inspected the triangular hole. A small stream of
water swirled into it from the nearest pool.

Hot air gushed up. The cursed flame
had
to be down there, protected by the obelisk until Jal-Nish had,
evidently, toppled it with Reaper. Had he done so to destroy the power here, or
because this monument to the ultimate failure of all endeavours gave the lie to
his own life’s purpose?

Thump!
This time
the impact felt closer. It shook the plateau, churning the water in the nearby
pool and sending a surge past her into the triangular hole. The obelisk moved a
little further towards the horizontal. Another shock and it must fall, which
would close the hole again.

Something went whistling and hissing through the air high
above, though at first she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. It looked like
a gigantic cable snaking across the sky, running up from the far edge of the
plateau, its coils slowly straightening as though a winch in the clouds, whence
it originated, drew it tight. Jal-Nish was definitely here now.

Maelys didn’t wait to see what he was going to do. She put
her feet into the hole, lowered them as far as they would go and wriggled in,
supporting herself on the edges with her forearms while she peered down. She
couldn’t see much, for the lantern’s rays were at the wrong angle, but there
appeared to be a fall of about a span onto a flat rock. She picked up the
lantern, took a deep breath and dropped.

The flat rock was covered in a yellow growth. Her feet went
from under her and she landed on her bottom, which was just as well, as the
surface was only a few paces across. It was the foundation stone for the
obelisk, and extended straight down into darkness on all sides. If she’d
slipped …

Water showered on her head. She wiped her face and looked
around. A hole in the centre of the stone was blocked with debris. To her left
across the gap Maelys made out another triangular opening, this time in a
gently sloping rock face, about the size of the surface she was sitting on. The
hole looked like the top of a tight triangular staircase and warm air wafted
from the opening, though there was no way to get to it except by jumping the
gap and she wasn’t sure she could do it.

But everything depended on her, so she had to get across.

It wasn’t a difficult jump for an athlete, or even a
foolhardy youth, but it looked an awfully long way to a bookish girl who
preferred reading about adventures to having them. If she missed she’d fall and
break her neck. If she landed on top of the stairs the result would probably be
the same.

What if she sprang for the stair hole but held the staff out
above her head so she couldn’t fall through? It might work, though the impact
would probably tear her hands off.

Maelys swiftly unknotted the cords from the bottom of
Flydd’s coat, plaited them into two short lengths of rope and tied it around
her wrists. She bound the other ends to the staff, then stood up and scuffed
the slime off the rock with the side of her boot to get a better footing. She
estimated the jump, moved the staff so it wouldn’t hit the wall, and flexed her
legs.

It looked such a long way. She wasn’t sure she could jump
that far from a standing start. In fact, she was sure she couldn’t. Maelys
flexed again. The gap looked even wider.

Just go! She tied the lantern to her belt and tried to jump;
she bent her knees and sprang almost all the way up, but baulked at the last second.
She was too much of a coward. Maelys tried to talk herself into the jump, but
thinking about it only made it worse. She could imagine all the things that
might go wrong, fatally.

So don’t think about it. Just do it.
Jump!

Maelys jumped, though as soon as her feet left the ground
she imagined the staff breaking under her weight. The jump was almost perfect
– her feet passed through the sides of the stair hole, her thigh and
shoulder scraped along its edge, then the staff whacked down on top. Her weight
tore her hands off the staff, just as she’d expected, and she hung from the
creaking, splintered wood by the plaited ropes.