The Infernal Lands (The Aionach Saga Book 1) (59 page)

All the way back to Sai Calgoar, the herdsmen were rough and
uncommunicative. The journey passed in a blur as Daxin began to fade, the
result of too much heat and too little water. Someone must have sent a
messenger to Lethari’s household, because men came shortly after they reached
the city to carry him away on a two-pole canvas stretcher. Frayla greeted him
at the door with a worried string of Calgoàric he was too drowsy and feverish
to translate.

Warlocks and shamans came and went over the next few days,
but nothing they could do for Daxin seemed to help. Then one day, Daxin woke to
find Lethari standing in the doorway as afternoon light flooded in through the curtains.
Frayla was standing behind him, her arms wrapped around him and her head
propped on his shoulder. Lethari Prokin was as hardened a warleader as they
came in the nomad tribes, but the sight of his dear friend in such dire anguish
seemed to soften him.

“Dax,” he said, moving forward to kneel at his bedside. “Tell
me how this happened to you.”

Daxin forced air through his windpipe. The effort set an open
flame to burning in his throat. “Doesn’t. Matter.”

Lethari leaned closer, straining to hear. The nomad looked
tired, worn smooth like the edges of a wooden railing after the touch of many
hands.

Daxin’s voice was nothing more than a hiss. “Lethari, we’ve
been friends for a long time. We’ve ridden many horizons together. My last gift
to you is the routes of every Vantanible caravan in the Inner East. This time,
I want you to hit Vantanible so hard he’ll never recover.” Daxin began to
recite the caravan schedule; the dates, times, and routes he’d pored over for
hours to memorize.

Lethari had one of his servants bring him a dried animal hide
and an old ink pen to write with. Daxin’s whole throat was ablaze with slivers
of sharp pain, but he fought through it, never stopping until he was done.

“What of your brother?” Lethari asked, when Daxin was done. “Is
Toler not still one of Vantanible’s shepherds? You know that if I send my war
parties after every caravan, I cannot promise he will be spared.”

Daxin nodded weakly. “I know. Forget about my brother. I’ve
taken care of him. Lethari, I have a favor to ask.”

“Anything. Ask, and it will be done.”

“There’s a place in the Skeletonwood. A village, hidden away
beneath a stone…”

The people of Dryhollow Split were a bitter stain on Daxin’s
memory. Maybe he’d taught them to survive. Maybe he’d given them a little hope.
But he was also the reason they’d had to leave their entire lives behind and
flee Unterberg. He owed them more than to turn his back on them, yet he’d
abandoned them when they needed him most.
Ellicia may never forgive me for
that
, he reflected. Vantanible would send more innocent people fleeing for
their lives after this next round of attacks took place. It was up to Toler now
to come clean and admit that he’d let the trade routes fall into the wrong
hands. But those hands—Daxin’s hands—would be long gone by the time that ever
happened. If it happened at all.

As the sepsis spread inside him, Daxin wondered if he’d been
wrong to spurn Ellicia and deny himself that small piece of happiness. He still
wasn’t sure. It seemed he’d made a habit of assuming he knew what people needed,
then trying to force it on them. He hated himself for that. He hated that he’d
chosen to push Ellicia away instead of giving her the love he’d wasted on somebody
else. He had wanted Victaria back more than anything in the world, but he knew now
that he could never have forced her to love him again. He could never have
forced Savvy to appreciate that he was searching for her mother, just as he
could never have forced Toler to fall out of love with Reylenn Vantanible and live
a quiet life in Bradsleigh. But it was too late now to ask for their forgiveness.

Now that he had armed Lethari to take the revenge he had been
dreaming of for so long, Daxin was surprised to find only emptiness where he
had expected to feel the satisfied thrill of victory. He knew in that moment,
as he lay dying, that Toler had been right.
Blood only gets you so far
,
his brother had said. Blood had become the price for Daxin’s transgressions, in
the end. It had only taken him far enough to realize he was in the wrong, but perhaps
that was far enough. Perhaps that made it right that he should die, since there
were so many who would’ve wanted it. He had won a hollow victory. It felt all
the more hollow to think of everyone he’d thrown by the wayside to win it; everyone
who would’ve been with him now, if he were dying in a more familiar place. He knew
then that he had mistaken obsession for principle; extremism for justice;
coercion for love. He only wished he’d known it sooner.

CHAPTER 53

To the Deeps

The cave wall was wet and slippery, but Lizneth managed
to climb as high as the overhang beside the waterfall, putting some distance
between herself and the cotterphages swimming in the deep pool below. There
were close to half a dozen, as best she could count, but they were no more than
half as long as she was tall; not nearly big enough to prey on someone of her
size, she hoped.

The rock wall rose up around every side, creating a deep
cylinder without a beach or landing. There were holes and crannies running all
the way around, running as high as the mass of stalactites that hung from the
ceiling like a great chandelier.
The cotterphages have nothing to feed on
down here; there must be an underwater tunnel somewhere that leads out
.
Lizneth wished Jakrizah had given her a potion that let her breathe underwater,
but there was nothing of the sort amongst those in her pack.

Climbing back up the waterfall seemed impossible—not to
mention that there was an angry, full-grown cotterphage awaiting her at the
other end. That left her with two options: she could explore the pool for
underwater passages, or choose a cranny at random and follow it wherever it led
her. Even if she could avoid the cotterphages and find an underwater passage,
it might be too long to swim through.
The choice is obvious
, she
decided.

The first cranny she chose came to a dead-end fifty fathoms
on; the second looped around and returned to the chamber; and the third shot straight
back a ways before going vertical, with walls too smooth to climb. After hours
of exploring, exhausted from climbing and crawling and fighting and being
chased, Lizneth collapsed where she stood and rested.

She could see the pool far below as she sat eating a handful
of kelp and the last of her salted gull. One of the burrow-kin had been holding
a dried scrap of something food-like in its pouch, but Lizneth didn’t like the
smell, and she wasn’t ready to eat it yet. She had plenty of water, at least.
Her keen sight was fading, and she could feel her senses going back to normal.
It would be time to bleed her eyes again soon, but she would wait until she got
to the surface to use the last of the Oculus Cordials.
If I ever find the
surface
, she thought sourly.
Or get my bearings at all. Beh dyagth, I’m
completely lost. Why does home have to feel so far away?

It seemed she was taking up Artolo’s cursing habit, for what
little other effect he’d had on her. She didn’t think about him as often as she
had thought of Bresh and Fane and Dozhie—and even Zhigdain. She would rather
they have been with her than Artolo. They hadn’t persuaded her to do things she
would come to regret, like he had. Their fathers weren’t slavers and murderers,
like his father was.

When she woke, Lizneth didn’t remember falling asleep. But
she knew she’d slept, and it must’ve been for a long time. The water in the
pool had risen; not by very much, but enough that she noticed. Her sight was
all but normal again, her tail warm and her wounds smarting. The fresh bumps
and scratches from the burrow-kin and the cotterphage stung over the dull ache
of those she’d received aboard Curznack’s galley weeks ago.

She felt refreshed despite the pain, but she was dirty from
crawling around in the tunnels, and there was nowhere to wash unless she wanted
to take her chances with the cotterphages. So she chose the nearest cranny and continued
her search for a way out. This tunnel soon began to look more promising than
the others. Then it curved downward.
I need to go up, not down.
She followed
it anyway, and found herself at the waterfront again.

Frustrated, she turned back and began to climb. She climbed
faster when she heard voices from across the pool. They were only echoes,
indistinguishable at first. When she clambered to the top of the tunnel and
crawled out to look, three
calaihn
were arriving at the edge of their
own cranny. Theirs was a little higher up, and about a quarter of the way
around the circular chamber from where she lay. They were speaking something
different from the Aion-speech—their own language. What was it called?
Artolo
would know, and he’d know what they were saying, too.
It sounded like
gibberish to her, but they were laughing and carrying on as if they hadn’t a
care in the world, so whatever they were saying couldn’t be too important.

The shortest of the three cast a line into the pool, and
together they sat on the edge and waited. Lizneth stayed where she was, waiting
to see what they would do.
That passage must be the way up. If I’m patient,
I can scent them and find my way out after they leave
. Soon the line went
taut, and together the
calaihn
hauled up their catch. The cotterphage wriggled
viciously as they brought it close. One
calai
leaned out over the
precipice and slashed at its throat. Black blood spilled from the wound and ran
down in torrents. The beast began to writhe all the harder, its grumblings
shallow and wet-sounding. They held it there until it hung still. Then they
pulled it up and finished severing its head before they carried it away.

Lizneth climbed out onto the wall and inched over to their
tunnel. She stepped over the dark puddle near the opening and followed the
passage upward, through many twists and crossings. The surface was near, she
knew by the growing warmth. She could scent the saltrock and rotted leaf smell
of the
calaihn
, but the cotterphage’s odor was as strong as dead fish in
standing water, making theirs harder to follow. Each time she lost the trail
she had to backtrack until she found it again, stopping to scent in every
direction and spread her whiskers for movement on the air.

She was running by the time she reached the tunnel’s end,
through a sharp fold in the rock and out into a day that was bright enough to
stop her in her tracks. She’d forgotten what it felt like to be so blind,
without the Oculus Cordial to help her see. Still, she had never been so glad
to be in the daylight before. She cowered and retreated toward the tunnel to
put on her goggles, but a waiting hand took her by the scruff of the neck and
dragged her off her feet.

She heard another stream of gibberish in the slanted, lilting
tongue of the
calaihn
, and she found herself surrounded by them. They
prodded her with their spears and walking staves as they jeered at her. She
couldn’t tell whether the three she’d seen earlier were here or not; they all
looked so similar. For the brief moments she dared to open her eyes, she could
only look at the ground and try to tell them apart by the differences between
their feet.

One of them spoke at her in a rough voice. He repeated
himself twice before Lizneth shrugged and held up her hands.

“What are you saying? I don’t understand…”

The
calai
knelt.  “You know the Aion-speech, do you?
Tell us where your forces are moving.”

Artolo said the calaihn warriors know more of the old
tongue than their peasants do. These must be warriors.
“Moving? What
forces?”

“I do not want to pluck your claws out one by one, but I
will, if you do not tell me. Welli. Breith. Hold the
muirrhad
down.”

Rough hands pinned Lizneth to the ground. The
calai
produced a hard metal tool and set it around the first of her claws.

Lizneth was frantic. “Stop it. I don’t know anything about
any forces. I’m coming from Sai Calgoar. I have nothing to do with whatever
this is, and I have no information for you. You can torture me all you want,
but all I’ll be able to do is scream. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The
calai
let up, curious. “You are coming from Sai
Calgoar, you say. A slave escaped from its master, are you?”

“No. I’m not a slave. Not to any of you… hu-mans.” The word
came back to her as she said it, a memory of something she had heard. “I came
to Sai Calgoar by ship. Now I’m going home.”

“Where is home?”

“Bolck-Azock,” she lied.

“That is the big one, eh? We know it.” He turned to the
others. “That is where his agents have been hiring new warriors.”

“Whose agents? What warriors?”

“She really does not know. You really do not know, do you?”

“Sniverlik?” she blurted, without thinking. A mistake.

The
calai
took her by the snout, bringing his face
close to hers. “I knew you were one of his. He sent you to our fair city for
spying.”

“No, I’m not. He didn’t. It was a guess. A stupid guess.
Every
ikzhe
knows Sniverlik where I’m from. His name is known far and
wide among our kind. He’s notorious.”

“A big word for such a small creature. Yes, it is Sniverlik’s
forces we are after. If you have been to Sai Calgoar on your own business and
not his, you would not know his plans.”

Mama and Papa and Raial and Deequol and everyone in Tanley
were the first things on Lizneth’s mind when she heard Sniverlik’s name. She didn’t
know what he was planning, but she wanted to. “I’m no friend of Sniverlik’s.
Just because I’m an
ikzhe
doesn’t mean I’m on his side. Now let go of
me. Get these brutes off.”

The
calai
laughed, deep and hearty. “Let her up.” They
stood and watched her scramble to her feet.

Lizneth brushed herself off, but her fur was even filthier
now. She remembered what Bresh had told her when they’d first come to Sai
Calgoar.
There are good calaihn and bad—some who hate what they do
not know, and others who welcome it. Those calaihn are rare.

Lizneth hoped this
calai
was one of the rare ones.

“I’m on my way home,” she said, “and I can promise you if you
let me go I won’t get in your way. I don’t want to see Sniverlik succeed at
whatever he’s planning. He’s torn my family apart. My brood-brothers and
sisters, my younger siblings, my Mama and Papa… we all live in fear of him.”

“Okay, little one,” the
calai
said. “Calm yourself.
This will be no different from every
muirrhadi
uprising before it. A
nuisance that has to be put down.”

“If Sniverlik is behind it, it will be different,” Lizneth
said. “He’s always been satisfied with his control over the lesser villages. If
he’s stirring, it’s because something is making him restless. He’ll ally with
the burrow-kin soon, if he hasn’t already. I’d be surprised if he doesn’t have
hu-mans on his side, too.”

“You know a lot for a
muirrhad
who claims to have no
involvement.”

“I’ve lived under Sniverlik’s rule my entire life, as has my
family and everyone in my village. I know what he’s like.”

“Your
village
. I thought you said the big
sai
muirrhadi
was your home. Bolck-Azock, is it?”

“My village is two hours’ run from Bolck-Azock. I live near
it, not in it. If you don’t believe me, why don’t you just take me captive?”

“The little
muirrhad
is feisty, no?” There was more laughter
and jeering. The
calai
quieted them. “I will tell you why, little one. Because
I need you. I will send you on your way with a message for Sniverlik. If you
deliver it to him, your village’s hardest days will be behind it.”

Lizneth shook her head. “When Sniverlik is gone, one of his
sons will only take his place, just as he took Ankhaz’s place after he
stretched him to death. That’s how it goes with the
ikzhehn
. It’s either
tradition or right of conquest that gives a
zhe
his power.”

“The master-king has ordered me to destroy Sniverlik, my
little friend. I always follow the master-king’s orders. If you deliver my
message, you may let me do it quicker. After I am done with Sniverlik, your
below-world belongs to you. The one who comes after him is none of my concern.
Perhaps the next one to take his place will be kinder to you and your village,
eh? You stay with us tonight. I will give you my message in the morning.”

Cotterphage meat was slimy and pungent, but thinking
about the countless meals of dried kelp and salted gull meat she’d been forced
to endure made Lizneth devour it with fervor. She’d had to smell the
calaihn
and their disgusting sweat all afternoon, but even that hadn’t weakened her
appetite. She was convinced that even if she spent every day with them from now
until the end of her life, she would still find them off-putting.
Repulsive
.
That was the word Fane had used.

“See the warlock when you finish,” the
calai
told her,
when she was almost done eating. His tone made it clear that she was to do what
he said without argument. She could see him better in the growing dusk than she
had earlier in the day, but he was so similar to the other
calaihn
that
she still couldn’t have picked him out from a group. He was tall, broad in the
shoulders and narrow through the legs, with deep scars across his chest and
black head-fur that rose in a tall plume from front to back and was shaven off
at the sides.

As Lizneth wove through the
calai
camp, she could feel
their eyes on her. Not stares of lust like the bucks had given her in
Bolck-Azock, but narrow-eyed looks of mistrust. Even their steeds grew uneasy
when she passed by, clacking their hooves on the rocks, pulling at their guide
ropes, and making frightened noises through flared nostrils.

The warlock was an emaciated man with ornamental bones
piercing his nose and ears. His chest bore decorative scarring like many of the
others, but his scars were painted with thin seams of red and black and yellow.
The colors didn’t wash off, even when he cleansed himself at a stone basin. “
Shoethgeti
,”
he said, twirling his finger.

Lizneth made an obedient about-face, hoping that was what he
meant. She heard him pick up one of his bowls, and jumped when he began to rub something
cold and wet on her shoulder. She turned her head to find that it was an
orangey-brown paste that had a smoky, sweet smell.